Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News — Genes shape our health and appearance more than they shape our personality, suggests a new study of thousands of people in a genetically isolated part of the world. According to the study, published in the August issue of PLoS Genetics, genetics account for roughly 51 percent of a person’s height, weight and overall body shape, 25 percent of cardiovascular function, and about 40 percent of certain blood characteristics, such as sugar and cholesterol levels. But genes only account for about 19 percent of many documented personality traits, such as neuroticism, extraversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness. "My personal view is that we have evolved to have very diverse personalities and that, compared to other traits, personality may be much less deterministic than other human characteristics," said Gonçalo Abecasis, one of the study’s authors. "My view is that both genes and environment will play smaller roles than random factors." Abecasis, a scientist at the Center for Statistical Genetics at the University of Michigan, and his colleagues examined 6,148 people from the Mediterranean island of Sardinia, where many residents are related. Roughly 95 percent of all test subjects’ grandparents were Sardinian, and the test group included 5,000 pairs of siblings. © 2006 Discovery Communications Inc.

Keyword: Genes & Behavior; Neuroimmunology
Link ID: 9294 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Eric Jaffe At the opening of Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey, a group of apes hovers around an object that has suddenly appeared in the desert. The sleek, black, rectangular object is five times as tall as the apes and clearly crafted by intelligent beings. The apes approach it with caution, and one animal runs a timid hand along the clean edges that glimmer in the sunlight. Suddenly, something clicks in the ape's mind. The sight of a sophisticated innovation has launched dormant aptitudes, and the ape has realized that a large bone can be used as a weapon to advance its kind. Standing more erect than before and brandishing the weapon, the ape attacks another group. The film then fast-forwards through the remainder of cognitive evolution in a flash: The bone, tossed into the air, becomes a space station floating through the cosmos. Too bad the camera didn't cut instead to a laboratory at the Max Planck Institute in Leipzig, Germany, where scientists are discovering details about apes' brains that could fill in some of the movie's multimillion-year gap. Researchers at the institute, Josep Call and Nicholas Mulcahy, recently demonstrated that apes possess a surprising understanding of tools and even make plans to use them. In fact, the study suggests that planning skills go back 14 million years to ancestors of apes and people. ©2006 Science Service.

Keyword: Evolution
Link ID: 9293 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Molecular geneticists Mario Capecchi and Petr Tvrdik stand over a mouse cage, lightly spraying compressed air over a mouse. But instead of flinching, the mouse doesn't close its eyes or wiggle its little whiskers. Capecchi says that's due to its genetics. It's lost the ability to control its facial muscles, similar to a human condition called Moebius Syndrome. Capecchi and Tvrdik created this condition in the mouse by turning off one of its many Hox genes, which are key in development of the embryo. This pioneering technique developed by Capecchi and others earned them the Albert Lasker Award in 2003. "We developed a technology which allowed us to change any gene we want to in the mouse," he says. "It allows us to inactivate a particular gene and see what effect it has on the mouse." In this study, they turned off the Hox gene that directs facial muscle development. "These muscles allow you, for example, to smile or to frown or to open and close your eyelids, even to shed tears. All of the things that you normally would do with your face," Capecchi says. This gene comes from a big family that was once a single gene. Almost like splitting up work in a factory, genes evolve by splitting up and specializing over time, a process called subfunctionalization. "A common theme during evolution is that you start out with a single gene and then you duplicate it," he says. "Then sometimes those genes are duplicated so that now we have a whole family of genes. The genes acquire new functions, and thereby greater complexity." © ScienCentral, 2000-2006

Keyword: Evolution; Emotions
Link ID: 9292 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Erika Check A newly discovered mystery gene may have helped build the modern human brain, researchers report today. Scientists don't know what the gene does. But they do know that humans have more copies of it than chimpanzees, monkeys, rats and mice. And they know that the gene makes a protein that is found in the human brain. That suggests that it may help to give the human brain its unique ability to think and reason, they say. "This really is a remarkable discovery," says Thomas Insel, director of the US National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Maryland, which was not involved in the research and did not fund it. "People are going to argue about it and be fascinated by this, because it takes us in a couple of directions we haven't really been in before." The work is part of the emerging tide of new discoveries made possible by the sequencing of several genomes closely related to humans, including the chimpanzee and the macaque monkey. Both of these species are in the branch of the evolutionary tree that gave rise to humans: the primate lineage. By comparing DNA among primates to DNA from more distant mammals, scientists are gaining clues to what makes primates, and people, unique (see 'Homing in on the genes for humanity'). ©2006 Nature Publishing Group

Keyword: Evolution; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 9291 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Drinking fruit and vegetable juices frequently may significantly cut the risk of developing Alzheimer's disease, a study suggests. US researchers followed almost 2,000 people for up to 10 years - providing a powerful set of results. They found the risk was 76% lower for those who drank juice more than three times a week, compared to those who drank it less than once a week. The study appears in the American Journal of Medicine. Alzheimer's is linked to the accumulation of clumps of beta-amyloid protein in the brain. There is some evidence to suggest that this process may be controlled by the chemical hydrogen peroxide. Various studies have suggested that polyphenols - chemicals available in many foods - might disrupt these processes and provide some protection against Alzheimer's disease by neutralising the effect of damaging compounds called free radicals. Fruit and vegetable juices are particularly rich in polyphenols. Lead researcher Dr Qi Dai, of Vanderbilt University, said: "We found that frequent drinking of fruit and vegetable juices was associated with a substantially decreased risk of Alzheimer's disease. "These findings are new and suggest that fruit and vegetable juices may play an important role in delaying the onset of Alzheimer's disease." Harriet Millward, of the Alzheimer's Research Trust, said: "Many scientists believe there is a link between the release of free radicals within the body and early changes to brain cells in people who ultimately go on to develop Alzheimer's disease. "Since fruit and vegetable juices are rich in antioxidants which 'mop up' free radicals, this interesting piece of research adds weight to this theory." (C)BBC

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 9290 - Posted: 08.31.2006

Anger can damage lung function, according to research. A US team followed 670 male military veterans and found those with high levels of hostility had poorer lung function than their happier peers. The scientists also found that the angriest men suffered a more rapid decline in lung capacity. Writing in the journal Thorax, the team said their findings could help develop new ways of targeting lung disease screening and prevention strategies. Scientists looked at men aged between 45 and 86 from the US Veterans Administration Normative Ageing Study. The volunteers had had their levels of hostility measured in 1986 through a series of questionnaires, which indicated their longer term emotional state, the researchers said. Their lung function was also measured and then analysed at routine intervals over an average period of just over eight years. Dr Rosalind Wright of Harvard Medical School, who led the research, said: "The men with higher levels of hostility had lower lung function at this baseline point in 1986, but they also showed a more rapid rate of decline over time." Other studies had shown that a rapid decline in lung function was linked to increased susceptibility to debilitating lung diseases, such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and cardiovascular disease, and increased mortality. But she said that, because the group were all ex-military, mainly white and of a lower socio-economic status, the findings could not be applied to the wider population. The researchers believe that anger and hostility could be affecting neurological and hormonal processes, which in turn could cause chronic inflammation in some of the body's systems, such as the lungs. (C)BBC

Keyword: Emotions
Link ID: 9289 - Posted: 08.31.2006

By David Brown The amount of nicotine in most cigarettes rose an average of almost 10 percent from 1998 to 2004, with brands most popular with young people and minorities registering the biggest increases and highest nicotine content, according to a new study. Nicotine is highly addictive, and while no one has studied the effect of the increases on smokers, the higher levels theoretically could make new smokers more easily addicted and make it harder for established smokers to quit. The trend was discovered by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, which requires that tobacco companies measure the nicotine content of cigarettes each year and report the results. As measured using a method that mimics actual smoking, the nicotine delivered per cigarette -- the "yield" -- rose 9.9 percent from 1998 to 2004 -- from 1.72 milligrams to 1.89. The total nicotine content increased an average of 16.6 percent in that period, and the amount of nicotine per gram of tobacco increased 11.3 percent. The study, reported by the Boston Globe, found that 92 of 116 brands tested had higher nicotine yields in 2004 than in 1998, and 52 had increases of more than 10 percent. © 2006 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 9288 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Drinking fruit and vegetable juices frequently may delay the onset of Alzheimer's disease. In a study published in the September issue of The American Journal of Medicine, researchers followed almost 2000 subjects for up to 10 years and found that the risk for developing Alzheimer's disease was reduced by 76% for those who drank fruit and vegetable juices more than 3 times per week compared with those who drank juices less than once per week. A lower reduction (16%) was obtained for juice consumption once or twice per week. Recent studies of Alzheimer's disease biochemistry have focused on the accumulation of beta-amyloid peptide in the brain, and the action of hydrogen peroxide in mediating this process. Various studies have suggested that polyphenols, strong anti-oxidants available in many foods, might disrupt these processes and provide some protection against Alzheimer's disease. Although some studies of anti-oxidant vitamins have been disappointing, this study is the first to examine juices rich in polyphenols as a preventive measure for Alzheimer's disease. The subjects were already part of the Kame Project, a prospective study of Japanese populations living in Hiroshima, Japan; Oahu, Hawaii; and the metropolitan area of Seattle, Washington. Drawing from the Seattle population, 1836 people were identified as free of dementia in 1992-1994, and were followed at 2-year time intervals until the end of 2001. Dietary consumption of fruit and vegetable juices was determined from self-administered questionnaires developed for Asian populations. Cognitive function was assessed by trained interviewers using a standardized test, with clinical follow-up resulting in clinical diagnoses for those patients showing impairment.

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 9287 - Posted: 08.31.2006

Scientists at SUNY Downstate Medical Center have discovered a molecular mechanism that maintains memories in the brain. In an article in Science magazine, they demonstrate that by inhibiting the molecule they can erase long-term memories, much as you might erase a computer disc. Furthermore, erasing the memory from the brain does not prevent the ability to re-learn the memory, much as a cleaned computer disc may be re-used. This finding may some day have applications in treating chronic pain, post-traumatic stress disorder, and memory loss, among other conditions. The SUNY Downstate researchers reported in the August 25 issue of Science that an enzyme molecule called “protein kinase M zeta” preserves long-term memories through persistent strengthening of synaptic connections between neurons. This is analogous to the mechanism storing information as 0’s and 1’s in a computer’s hard disc. By inhibiting the enzyme, scientists were able to erase a memory that had been stored for one day, or even one month. This function in memory storage is specific to protein kinase M zeta, because inhibiting related molecules did not disrupt memory. These findings may be useful for the treatment of disorders characterized by the pathological over-strengthening of synaptic connections, such as neuropathic pain, phantom limb syndrome, dystonia, and post-traumatic stress. Conversely, the identification of the core molecular mechanism for memory storage may focus effort on the development of specific therapeutic agents that enhance memory persistence and prevent memory loss. Earlier this year, SUNY Downstate scientists reported that PKMzeta was bound up in the tangles of Alzheimer's disease, thus perhaps blocking its function in memory storage.

Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 9286 - Posted: 06.24.2010

There is no single "God spot" in the brain, Canadian scientists say. A University of Montreal team found Christian mystical experiences are mediated by several brain regions. Researchers asked 15 nuns to recount mystical experiences while studying them on MRI scanners, the journal, Neuroscience Letters reported. There has been much debate about how the brain reacts during connections with God among religious followers. Some people went as far as suggesting there was a specific brain region designed for communication with God. But the researchers claim this study discredits those theories. Nuns are said to experience Unio Mystica - the Christian notion of a mystical union with God - during their 20s. Researchers asked the nuns aged 23 to 64-years-old to recount such mystical experiences and measured their brain activity through MRI scans. They found increased activity in at least 12 regions of the brain, including areas normally involved with self-consciousness and emotion. Lead researcher Dr Mario Beauregard said: "The main goal of the study was to identify the neural correlates of a mystical experience. Rather than there being one spot that relates to mystical experiences, we've found a number of brain regions are involved. This does not diminish the meaning and value of such an experience and neither does it confirm or disconfirm the existence of God." (C) BBC

Keyword: Brain imaging; Emotions
Link ID: 9285 - Posted: 08.30.2006

NEW BRUNSWICK/PISCATAWAY, N.J. – Engineers at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, have modified a popular home video game system to assist stroke patients with hand exercises, producing a technology costing less than $600 that may one day rival systems 10 times as expensive. The Rutgers hand rehabilitation system is an example of virtual rehabilitation, which combines virtual reality – computer-generated interactive visual environments in which users control actions in a lifelike way – with traditional therapy techniques. Virtual rehabilitation gives therapists new tools to do their jobs more effectively and engages patients who may otherwise lack interest or motivation to complete normal exercise regimens. The Rutgers engineers are describing their work at the fifth International Workshop on Virtual Rehabilitation taking place Aug. 29 and Aug. 30 in New York City. “Virtual reality is showing significant promise for promoting faster and more complete rehabilitation, but the cost of many systems is still prohibitive for widespread deployment in outpatient clinics or patients’ homes,” said Grigore Burdea, professor of electrical and computer engineering and a noted inventor of virtual rehabilitation technology. “While it’s essential to keep pursuing breakthrough technologies that will initially be costly, it’s just as important that we find ways to make innovative treatments accessible to the many patients who need them.” © 2006 Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

Keyword: Stroke
Link ID: 9284 - Posted: 06.24.2010

A new study at the Université de Montréal has concluded that there is no single God spot in the brain. In other words, mystical experiences are mediated by several brain regions and systems normally implicated in a variety of functions (self-consciousness, emotion, body representation). The study published in the current issue of Neuroscience Letters was conducted by Dr. Mario Beauregard from the Department of Psychology at the Université de Montréal and his student Vincent Paquette. "The main goal of the study was to identify the neural correlates of a mystical experience," explained Beauregard. "This does not diminish the meaning and value of such an experience, and neither does it confirm or disconfirm the existence of God." Fifteen cloistered Carmelite nuns ranging from 23 to 64-years-old were subjected to an fMRI brain scan while asked to relive a mystical experience rather than actually try to achieve one. "I was obliged to do it this way seeing as the nuns are unable to call upon God at will," said Beauregard. This method was justified seeing as previous studies with actors asked to enter a particular emotional state activated the same brain regions as people actually living those emotions.

Keyword: Brain imaging; Emotions
Link ID: 9283 - Posted: 08.30.2006

-- Researchers at the University at Buffalo studying the effects of alcohol on the brain, using zebrafish as a model, have identified several novel central nervous system proteins that are affected by chronic alcohol exposure. They also confirmed the involvement of additional proteins previously suggested as targets of alcohol toxicity, and observed abnormal behavior in the fish resulting from chronic alcohol exposure. Results of the research appeared in the Aug. 15 online edition of the European Journal of Pharmacology. Five proteins were found to be overexpressed and three were found to be underexpressed. These proteins are thought to be involved in critical mechanisms such as programmed cell death, cholesterol balance, amino acid metabolism, oxidative stress and signal transduction. "Identification of proteins that show selective changes in abundance after alcohol exposure has the potential to unlock new pathways both for understanding the mechanisms of alcoholism and alcohol toxicity, as well as its amelioration," said Richard A. Rabin, Ph.D., professor in the UB Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology and senior author on the study. © 2006 University at Buffalo.

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 9282 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Barry Fox Stimulating the tongue could help people with brain damage relearn how to ride a bike, or even to walk again, according to US company Wicab. Its patent application says injury or disease can upset the brain’s ability to balance the body, which hinders rehabilitation, but stimulating the tongue with mild electrical pulses provides the powerful stimulus needed to re-train the brain. Wicab has developed the technology to test the idea and has won a joint grant from the US government’s National Institutes of Health and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to prove it. A false palate with a square grid of 160 gold-plated electrodes is placed on the tongue and wirelessly connected to the output of a motion sensor and camera fitted on the patient’s head. The sensors deliver a coarse image of the scene ahead to the grid, which the tongue’s nerve cells send to the brain. Wicab’s say that with less than an hour’s training, the brain learns to correlate the input from the tongue with whatever other sensory signals it is getting from the eyes, inner ear and other parts of the body. As patients recover their balance they are weaned off the tongue-based assistance. The same system can be used to give blind people a coarse image of the outside world, without the need for eye implants. With only half an hour’s training a blind person can use tongue signals to catch a rolling ball, Wicab claims. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Vision; Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste)
Link ID: 9281 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Sandra G. Boodman They regularly visit doctors' offices complaining of baffling combinations of symptoms for which no medical cause can be found: chest pain one month, gynecologic problems the next, followed by headaches or crushing fatigue. Hospital staff privately refer to them as "crocks" -- people who repeatedly show up in emergency rooms demanding expensive, exhaustive tests to unearth the elusive cause of their numerous symptoms. Reassurance that their tests don't show anything amiss has the opposite effect, convincing these patients that physicians haven't looked hard enough -- or don't believe them. While everyone at some point experiences symptoms for which no cause is found, patients who have what is known as somatization disorder suffer from a host of disabling problems. Most are women who develop the lifelong disorder during adolescence. It's impossible to accurately determine how many patients have somatization disorder, although the problem "probably occurs on a continuum and accounts for many, many doctor visits," said Lesley Allen, an associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. © 2006 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Stress; Neuroimmunology
Link ID: 9280 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By ERIC NAGOURNEY Researchers have found that different kinds of strokes are more likely to occur at different times of day, perhaps because of the body’s natural clock. Writing in The Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry, the researchers reported that three types of stroke all had two peak periods during the day: in the morning and in the evening. But the researchers, led by Dr. Shinichi Omama of Iwate Medical University in Japan, found that the peaks were not uniform. Occurrence of the most common type of stroke, for example, in which blood flow to the brain is cut off, peaked in the morning. Occurrence of the two other kinds, which involve bleeding in the brain or, more rarely, at its surface, peaked in the afternoon. The researchers reviewed first-time strokes among about 13,000 people from 1991 to 1996. Bleeding and clotting strokes have similar triggers, the researchers said, leading to questions about why the occurrence would vary with the hour of the day. Some research has shown that the blood is more prone to clotting in the morning, which may promote the second type of stroke and inhibit the first. The study also found that, over all, strokes are least likely to occur during sleep because blood pressure, a trigger, is lower then. Still, low blood pressure is also a trigger for clotting strokes. Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Biological Rhythms; Stroke
Link ID: 9279 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Boston, MA-- According to the most comprehensive survey yet completed of mental health among Hurricane Katrina survivors from Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi, the proportion of people with a serious mental illness doubled in the months after the hurricane compared to a survey carried out several years before the hurricane. The study also found that thoughts of suicide did not increase despite the dramatic increase in mental illness. The authors suggest that this low rate of suicide thoughts is due to optimistic beliefs about the success of future recovery efforts. The research, which was published today in a special online edition of the Bulletin of the World Health Organization, was led by researchers from Harvard Medical School (HMS). "The increase in mental illness among Katrina survivors is not surprising, but the low suicidality is a surprise," says Ronald Kessler, PhD, professor of health care policy at HMS and lead author of the study. "Our concern, though, is that this lowering of suicidal tendencies appears to be strongly associated with expectations for recovery efforts that might not be realistic." This report is the first in a planned series based on the Hurricane Katrina Community Advisory Group, a statistically representative sample of hurricane survivors participating in ongoing tracking surveys to monitor the pace and mental health effects of hurricane recovery efforts. The project is funded by the National Institute of Mental Health and the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services for Planning and Evaluation.

Keyword: Stress; Depression
Link ID: 9278 - Posted: 08.29.2006

Bob Holmes Chimpanzees can pass knowledge from one individual to the next with nearly perfect accuracy through several "generations" of teacher and learner, a new study shows. This ability, which has never been demonstrated in chimps before, means that these apes have one of the key skills needed to create and maintain true cultural differences among groups. Researchers have known for many years that different groups of wild chimps behave differently. However, without controlled experiments it is impossible to know for certain whether these represent adaptations to subtly different conditions or different traditions inherited culturally within each group. Victoria Horner, a primate behaviourist at the University of St Andrews, UK, and colleagues tested whether chimps are capable of transmitting knowledge faithfully through a chain of learners. The researchers devised a box whose door could be opened in either of two ways, by lifting a flap or sliding it sideways. "Then we basically set up the telephone game [also known as Chinese whispers] with chimpanzees," Horner explains. See footage of the sliding chimps and the lifting chimps in action (both avi format, 3.2MB and 2.5MB) © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Evolution; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 9277 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Lydia Fong A child in the study observes dolls in a puppet theater. Click on the image to watch a video at the University of Oregon website. In a discovery that could shed light on the development of the human brain, University of Oregon researchers determined that infants as young as six months old can recognize simple arithmetic errors. The researchers used puppets to portray simple addition problems. For example, in order to illustrate the incorrect equation 1 + 1 = 1, researchers showed infants one puppet, then added a second. A board was then raised to block the infant's view of both puppets, and one was removed. When the board was lowered, only a single puppet remained. To gauge the infants' ability to detect the error, researchers recorded the number of seconds the babies spent looking at the puppet. According to the study, babies ranging from six to nine months old looked at incorrect solutions 1.1 seconds longer than correct ones. This extended viewing correlated with EEG measurements showing higher activity in a frontal area of the brain that is known to be involved in error detection in adults. The team's findings are published in the August 7th online edition of The Proceedings of the Natural Academy of Sciences. © Copyright 2006 Seed Media Group, LLC.

Keyword: Development of the Brain
Link ID: 9276 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Emily Anthes During mating season, male bowerbirds make elaborate ground-level structures out of sticks, moss and leaves, then decorate these bowers with colorful flowers, stones and shells. They sometimes even "paint" them with berries. When the time comes, the females choose to mate with the males that have built the biggest, most symmetric and best decorated nests. While male bowerbirds' creative displays have a clear function, the purpose of human creativity is not as well understood. Some scientists theorize that problem solving, which is one facet of creativity, confers a survival advantage and probably evolved via natural selection. But a new study by Arizona State University researchers provides evidence that creativity could also be the result of a complementary process known as sexual selection. According to sexual selection, traits attractive in a mate will become more common over time, as the individual animals that display those traits pass on their genes more often than animals that don't. Sexual selection can lead to traits that don't have a direct survival advantage but serve to advertise the fitness of their bearer's genes. © Copyright 2006 Seed Media Group, LLC.

Keyword: Sexual Behavior; Evolution
Link ID: 9275 - Posted: 06.24.2010