Janet Raloff Erin Chesky was a sleep-troubled teen, typical of many. Despite going to bed early each night, this honor roll student struggled to doze off—sometimes lying awake until 3 a.m. Each morning, she fought equally hard to wake up at 5:30, in time to eat breakfast and catch the school bus. Forever tired, "I was like a zombie," she recalls. Last fall, a sleep specialist examined the 17-year-old from Colonie, N.Y. He diagnosed her with delayed sleep-phase syndrome, a condition in which the body's internal clock fails to synchronize appropriately with Earth's day-night cycle, which changes a few minutes each day. From birth, Erin and her siblings were night owls. When Erin turned 15 however, her biological clock really got off-kilter, triggering insomnia that threatened her schoolwork. Her mom recognized the affliction; it had struck her at the same age. For such teens, adhering to class schedules can be "like swimming upstream," says psychologist Paul Glovinsky of the Capital Region Sleep and Wake Disorders Center at St. Peter's Hospital in Albany, N.Y. Some teens fail to make it to school on time, or at all, 30 or more days a year. Copyright ©2006 Science Service

Keyword: Biological Rhythms; Sleep
Link ID: 8974 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Bruce Bower Henry was headed for serious trouble. The 15-year-old provoked an endless series of fights at school and frequently bullied girls. Teachers regularly suspended him for his classroom disruptions. Older students taunted Henry in the hallways by calling him a sexual pervert or jeered him for having been held back in kindergarten. At home, his father browbeat and denigrated the boy, while his mother cried and muttered about how sick Henry had become. Henry liked violent video games. He downloaded information from a Web site on how to make pipe bombs and drew pictures of gory deaths of people who mistreated him. The boy openly expressed jealousy of the attention lavished on the youths in Columbine, Colo., who in 1999 fatally shot 12 of their classmates and a teacher and then committed suicide. In 2001, Henry's life took a fortunate turn. At his high school principal's insistence, he and his parents sought psychotherapy from Stuart W. Twemlow of the Menninger Clinic in Houston. In individual and family sessions, psychiatrist Twemlow zeroed in on the boy's fury at his parents and his tendency at school to view himself as a passive victim who needed to strike back at evil tormenters. Copyright ©2006 Science Service

Keyword: Aggression
Link ID: 8973 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Drinking alcohol every day protects against heart disease in men but not in women, Danish research shows. A study of 50,000 people found that men who drank daily had a 41% reduced risk of coronary heart disease compared with a 7% drop in men who drank once a week. In women, the risk of heart disease fell by a third with a weekly drink but did not fall further in daily drinkers. Experts warned the results, published in the British Medical Journal, should not be used to justify heavy drinking. Previous research has shown that moderate alcohol intake is associated with a lower risk of heart disease, but up until now most studies have been in men. Men and women aged 50-65 who took part in this study were questioned on their drinking behaviour and then followed for an average of six years. Women drank an average of five and a half drinks a week, and men consumed 11. In men, the risk of heart disease fell significantly with increased frequency of drinking - with men who drank a little every day having the lowest risk. But for women, although drinking on at least one day a week was associated with a 36% reduced risk of heart disease compared to those who drank more rarely, the risk was the same whether women had one drink a week or drank moderately each day. The researchers said how much women drank may be more important for protection against heart disease than how often they drank. (C)BBC

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 8972 - Posted: 05.26.2006

By Marc Kaufman The largest study of its kind has unexpectedly concluded that smoking marijuana, even regularly and heavily, does not lead to lung cancer. The new findings "were against our expectations," said Donald Tashkin of the University of California at Los Angeles, a pulmonologist who has studied marijuana for 30 years. "We hypothesized that there would be a positive association between marijuana use and lung cancer, and that the association would be more positive with heavier use," he said. "What we found instead was no association at all, and even a suggestion of some protective effect." Federal health and drug enforcement officials have widely used Tashkin's previous work on marijuana to make the case that the drug is dangerous. Tashkin said that while he still believes marijuana is potentially harmful, its cancer-causing effects appear to be of less concern than previously thought. Earlier work established that marijuana does contain cancer-causing chemicals as potentially harmful as those in tobacco, he said. However, marijuana also contains the chemical THC, which he said may kill aging cells and keep them from becoming cancerous. © 2006 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 8971 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by David Ng I'm always drawn to the early episodes in a season of "American Idol." They're entertaining, as guilty pleasures tend to be, but also intriguing in a way that speaks to my scientific curiosity. I'm referring to the multitude of contestants that perform, umm...shall we say, dissonantly—meaning they are seriously out of tune, even awful. What's especially interesting is that often these same contestants are completely ignorant of this fact, sometimes defiantly so. As a scientist, I feel compelled to seek an explanation somewhere in the scientific literature. Fortunately, music is something that's ubiquitous in all human cultures, geographically and historically. Consequently, there is a lot of research out there—although regrettably, a lot of it tends to use an upsetting amount of science jargon. We should be grateful that album liner notes do not contain sentences like: Thanks go to the "physiological studies in monkeys [that] suggest that roughness may be represented in the primary auditory cortex by oscillatory neuronal ensemble responses phase-locked to the amplitude-modulated temporal envelope of complex sounds." A significant chunk of this literature focuses on the concept of pitch, a subjective quality, depending entirely on the listener's perception of a musical note. Likewise, this inherently also involves the notion of frequency, the cold empirical measure equating a note to the number of vibrations per second it produces. Pitch differs from frequency in the same way the statement, "That's a nice sounding A" differs from the statement, "It's emitting at 440 Hz." © Copyright 2006 Seed Media Group, LLC.

Keyword: Hearing
Link ID: 8970 - Posted: 06.24.2010

A young Australian scientist has made an important discovery about how brain cells communicate. This finding is central to understanding all brain function – from laying down memory to being able to walk The groundbreaking research has been published in the latest edition of world-leading journal Nature Neuroscience. Victor Anggono, a PhD student at the Children's Medical Research Institute (CMRI), set out to identify the molecular partners of a key protein called dynamin, and how their partnership allows neurons to send messages . The result was astounding. A protein called syndapin, previously thought to have no major role in nerve communication, was proven to be the molecule that simultaneously works with dynamin to allow the transmission of messages between nerve cells. The brain functions by sending chemical messages between nerves. The messages, or neurotranmsitters, are held in tiny packages at the nerve terminal where they are released to send a signal. The packages then return to the cell and are re-filled so that brain function can continue. In collaboration with researchers from the University of Edinburgh further studies have revealed that by blocking the interaction of these two proteins nerve communication shuts down.

Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 8969 - Posted: 06.24.2010

EAST LANSING, Mich. – Although most of us cringe at the sound of the words “parasitic worms,” it’s a fact that some of these creatures are actually good for us. At Michigan State University, researcher Linda Mansfield is part of a national team of scientists investigating the role that parasites can play in treating inflammatory bowel disease, or IBD, in humans. Her research is part of a more than $10 million National Institutes of Health grant supporting the Food and Waterborne Diseases Integrated Research Network of laboratories launched by the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Some researchers argue that improved hygiene throughout the developed world may be responsible for inflammatory bowel disease, as well as a whole range of autoimmune disorders. According to this "hygiene hypothesis," immune systems require exposure to infections of all sorts early in life in order to develop sufficiently. Intriguingly, inflammatory bowel disease, which has two forms – Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis – is virtually unknown in the developing world, while it is increasing dramatically in developed societies. When people from developing countries move to developed ones, their incidence of the disease tends to increase. © 2006 Michigan State University Division of University Relations

Keyword: Stress; Neuroimmunology
Link ID: 8968 - Posted: 06.24.2010

It takes time – between three and 12 months – before a new type of therapy for treatment-resistant depression starts to benefit patients, according to new preliminary brain scan research that confirms earlier observations by psychiatrists about vagal nerve stimulation. Saint Louis University, working in collaboration with Washington University School of Medicine, conducted a pilot study of brain scans of a small group of depressed patients who received vagal nerve stimulation after failing other therapies. Positron emission tomography (PET) scans showed significant changes in brain activity starting three months after vagal nerve stimulation treatment began. These changes continued to evolve over the course of the next 21 months. These changes in brain scans appear to "roughly parallel" the significantly delayed effects that psychiatrists observed in improvement in mood. "The effects come after a significant period of treatment time," said Charles Conway, M.D., an assistant professor of psychiatry at Saint Louis University School of Medicine and the lead investigator of a vagal nerve stimulation research project conducted between 2000 and 2004. Psychiatrists are not used to such a long time lag before a treatment begins to be effective, he added.

Keyword: Depression
Link ID: 8967 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Rossella Lorenzi, Discovery News — Cell phone exposure stirs the brain, according to an Italian study which investigated the effects of mobile phone emissions on the motor cortex. The study, accepted for publication in the Annals of Neurology, proved that the electromagnetic fields generated by cell phones produce an increase in excitability within the brain's cortex. The cortex is the largest part of the human brain, associated with higher brain function. "We still do not know whether this effect is neutral or potentially dangerous or beneficial to brain functioning," Paolo Maria Rossini, a neurologist with the Fatebenefratelli IRCCS Research Centre of Brescia, told Discovery News. Rossini and colleagues used a technique called paired-pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation to investigate cortical excitability in 15 healthy young male volunteers. Each volunteer was exposed to emissions from phones using the Global System for Mobile Communications, or GSM. The researchers mounted a common GSM phone to the left side of the subject's head by using a modified helmet that assured a constant distance of 15 mm between phone and ear. An identical phone, without battery, was positioned on the right side of the head. © 2006 Discovery Communications Inc.

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 8966 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Girls from broken homes may grow up to be less attractive, research published by the Royal Society shows. Two studies from a team at St Andrew's University suggested that women whose parents had separated or had a poor relationship looked more masculine. Researchers assessed facial features and body shape in 229 women and found those from stable homes appeared more feminine and healthy. The results may be linked to levels of testosterone - the male sex hormone. However, it is unclear if increased testosterone in the offspring of parents who separate is genetic or caused by stress of an unhappy family life. Researchers took photographs of psychology students who had completed a questionnaire about their family background. The pictures were rated for attractiveness, feminity, and healthiness. Women whose parents had a good relationship were found to be significantly more attractive than women whose parents had separated. Women whose parents had stayed together but had a poor relationship were rated the least attractive of the three groups and were also judged to be the least healthy. In a second study of 87 of the same young women, researchers assessed body mass index, waist-hip ratio, and waist-chest ratio. Growing up with parents who had a poor relationship was associated with increased weight around the waist, producing a more masculine figure and an increased body mass index. The findings are published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society. (C)BBC

Keyword: Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 8965 - Posted: 05.25.2006

By Rebecca Morelle Mice with the mutant gene have a white-tipped tail and white feet Scientists say they have demonstrated that animals can defy the laws of genetic inheritance. Researchers found that mice can pass on traits to their offspring even if the gene behind those traits is absent. The scientists suggest RNA, a chemical cousin of DNA, passes on the characteristic - in this experiment, a spotty tail - to later generations. But more work may be needed to confirm the conclusions of the study, which appears in the journal Nature. The research focuses on a gene called Kit, which comes in two varieties: "normal" and "mutant". The mice inherit two Kit genes, one from each parent; a mutant version gives them a spotty tail. According to Mendel's laws of genetic inheritance, the combination of normal and mutant Kit genes inherited by the mice should alone determine whether the mouse has a spotted or unspotted tail. The scientists, based at the French Institute of Health and Medical Research (Inserm) and the University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis, used mice which carry one normal version of Kit and one mutant version, giving them spotted tails. They bred these mice together, producing offspring with a range of Kit gene combinations: two mutant genes (these are shown to die shortly after birth) one mutant and one normal gene (these should be "spotty" like their parents) two normal genes (these should not be spotty). However, the researchers found that mice born with two normal versions of Kit also had a spotted appendage. "We were very surprised to see this," said Professor Minoo Rassoulzadegan, a geneticist at the University of Nice and lead author on the paper. (C)BBC

Keyword: Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 8964 - Posted: 05.25.2006

A Queensland Brain Institute-led team has identified a molecule that plays a key role in establishing the major nerve connections between each side of the adult brain. QBI neural migration laboratory head Associate Professor Helen Cooper said her group's research provided new clues regarding development of the corpus callosum, the main connecting nerve tract that shuttles information between the left and right hemispheres of the adult brain. Using a mouse model, neuroscientists at The University of Queensland – working with Associate Professor Steven Stacker and his team at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research in Melbourne – have identified a molecule that helps control development of the corpus callosum. The corpus callosum has millions of individual nerve fibres. If these fibres fail to reach their correct targets in the opposite hemisphere, people can suffer from epilepsy, and experience some degree of mental retardation. "Our study is the first to identify a growth molecule that guides young nerves away from the corpus callosum and towards their targets in the opposite hemisphere," Dr Cooper said. "We have shown that the Ryk receptor molecule facilitates the targeting of individual nerve fibres.

Keyword: Development of the Brain; Laterality
Link ID: 8963 - Posted: 06.24.2010

LA JOLLA, CA - It doesn't take John Wayne's deliberate, pigeon-toed swagger or Marilyn Monroe's famously wiggly sway to judge a person's gender based on the way they move. People are astonishingly accurate when asked to judge the gender of walking human figures, even when they are represented by 15 small dots of light attached to major joints of the body. And not only that, when human observers watched the walking motion of a male so-called "point light walker," they were more sensitive to the female attributes when watching the next figure in the sequence. This suggests that the human brain relies on specialized neurons that tell gender based on gait, report researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in the May 21 advance online edition of Nature Neuroscience. "Our judgment of gender can adapt within seconds," says senior author Gene Stoner, a neuroscientist in the Vision Center Laboratory at the Salk Institute. "The gaits of males and females may vary geographically or culturally and this mechanism allows us to adapt very quickly to local ways of walking," he adds. How humans move reflects, in part, gender-specific differences in shape such hip-to-waist ratio and the like. Such inherent differences in gait might then be exaggerated by an individual to emphasize their gender. "Our new data suggests that there are neurons selective for gender based on these motion cues and that they adjust their selectivity on the fly," Stoner explains.

Keyword: Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 8962 - Posted: 05.25.2006

by John R. Searle Review by Maria Antonietta Perna Granted, as an introductory text Mind: A Brief Introduction might be said to be particularly brief. However, if Searle keeps his introduction brief, this is because the present book does much more than introducing the reader to a fascinating philosophical subject in clear and accessible language. What Searle aims to do is far more ambitious: along the lines of his previous publications on the philosophy of mind, especially those dealing with consciousness and language, he argues for a radical break with the entire post-Cartesian tradition and its conceptual framework in which the entire discipline is steeped. In fact, it is the main thesis of the book as stated in the Preface that the philosophy of mind is unique among contemporary philosophical subjects, in that all of the most famous and influential theories are false (p.1). By 'theories' Searle means all kinds of dualist positions as well as the various existing materialist approaches. However, in the midst of false assumptions and consequent misguided views with which this branch of philosophy is allegedly bedevilled, there lie core elements of truth, and Searle's self-appointed task here is to bring them to the reader's attention and show how they can be fitted into a coherent account of the mind and its relation with the world. The title of the first chapter is telling: 'A Dozen Problems in the Philosophy of Mind'. Searle points out that, in contrast with most philosophical subjects, the general stance of most professionals in the philosophy of mind differs from that upheld by the majority of the educated general public. Most people believe in some sort of dualism according to which human beings are endowed with a mind or soul and a body, whereas contemporary professionals in the field do accept some version of materialism, thus doing away with any notion of an immaterial soul. Most of the twelve problems presented in this chapter, Searle explains, are mostly part of Descartes' legacy to philosophy. © 2006 Maria Antonietta Perna.

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 8961 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Although deficits in measures of intelligence are well documented among children exposed to high amounts of alcohol during pregnancy, deficits among children prenatally exposed to low-to-moderate amounts of alcohol are much less understood. A study in the June issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research has found that even light to moderate drinking – especially during the second trimester – is associated with lower IQs in offspring at 10 years of age. "The impact of heavy prenatal alcohol exposure on IQ ranges from a two- to a seven-point decrease," said Jennifer A. Willford, assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and lead author of the study. "IQ is a measure of the child's ability to learn and to survive in his or her environment. It predicts the potential for success in school and in everyday life. Although a small but significant percentage of children are diagnosed with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) each year, many more children are exposed to alcohol during pregnancy who do not meet criteria for FAS yet experience deficits in growth and cognitive function." "Intellectual functioning is a good first measure of the potential damaging effects of prenatal alcohol exposure," added Paul D. Connor, clinical director of the Fetal Alcohol and Drug Unit and assistant professor in the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the University of Washington. "However, mental retardation only characterizes a minority of patients with FAS and Alcohol-Related Neurodevelopmental Disorder (ARND). There are a number of domains of cognitive functioning that can be impaired even in the face of a relatively normal IQ, including academic achievement (especially arithmetic), adaptive functioning, and executive functions (the ability to problem solve and learn from experiences).

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 8960 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News — Human ears can wiggle and make noise, and now researchers have a better understanding of how these unusual processes work. Since ear wiggling involves complex coordination of facial muscles, the research could shed light on related disorders, such as Bell’s palsy, which can cause facial paralysis. The ear sounds research, meanwhile, is surprisingly illuminating when it comes to gender and sexuality issues. This is because heterosexual men and women and homosexual women appear to produce different levels of ear noise. While most human ears produce sound, controlled, detectable ear wiggling is not as common. "The mechanism behind ear movements is sophisticated," said Bastiaan ter Meulen, who led the ear wiggling study. Ter Meulen, a researcher at Erasmus MC, a university medical center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, added that, unlike other facial muscles, ear muscles have their own accessory nucleus -- a control area for muscle function -- in the brainstem. Copyright © 2006 Discovery Communications Inc.

Keyword: Hearing; Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 8959 - Posted: 06.24.2010

A good night's sleep may not just leave you feeling refreshed - it may also help to you keep trim. Researchers from Ohio's Case Western Reserve University, followed nearly 70,000 women for 16 years. They found women who slept five or fewer hours a night were a third more likely to put on at least 33lbs (15kg) than sound sleepers during that time. Details were presented to the American Thoracic Society International Conference in San Diego. The study is by far the largest to track the effects of sleep habits on weight gain over a long period of time. It also found that lighter sleepers were 15% more likely to become obese compared with women who slept for seven hours a night. Obesity is defined as having a Body Mass Index (BMI) of 30 or more. BMI is calculated by dividing weight in kilograms by the square of height in metres. The researchers found that their findings had nothing to do with light sleepers eating too much, or taking too little exercise. On average, women who slept five hours or less per night weighed 5.4 pounds more at the beginning of the study than those sleeping seven hours, and gained an additional 1.6 pounds more over the next 10 years. Lead researcher Dr Sanjay Patel said: "That may not sound like much, but it is an average amount - some women gained much more than that, and even a small difference in weight can increase a person's risk of health problems such as diabetes and hypertension (blood pressure)." (C)BBC

Keyword: Sleep; Obesity
Link ID: 8958 - Posted: 05.24.2006

Since the dawn of time we have sought short-cuts to happiness. Early man got high on psychotropic drugs. Alcohol has been around since the stone age. The designer drugs of today promise ecstasy in a pill. Now neuroscientists are beginning to manipulate happiness in the brain. In a series of experiments in the 1950s and 1960s psychologists pinpointed the pleasure zones in the brains of rats and eventually in human patients. In 1954 Peter Milner and James Olds performed a radical experiment on rats. They implanted electrodes into rats' brains, and found that when they gave electrical brain stimulation the rats seemed to experience pleasure and almost ecstasy at times. The rats could press a lever which would deliver a small current deep into its brain. It was found that they would perform complex and difficult tasks for another dose of stimulation, and would even press the lever up to 2,000 times an hour to the exclusion of eating or drinking. Olds and Milner concluded that they had discovered the area of the brain responsible for reward. In the 1960s, psychiatrist Robert Heath of Tulane University in New Orleans chose to use this same deep brain stimulation on humans. He performed a series of experiments where he put electrodes deep into his patients' brains. Bob Heath hoped to cure depression, pain, and addiction. But controversially he also experimented on gay men. When a mild shock was administered to patients they felt good. When they were handed the controls they chose to press repeatedly - sometimes over a thousand times. But the pleasure stopped when the current was stopped and Heath eventually abandoned his work. In the last few years interest in deep brain stimulation has been taken up by mainstream medicine to help patients with Parkinson's Disease and also to tackle acute pain. (C)BBC

Keyword: Emotions; Drug Abuse
Link ID: 8957 - Posted: 05.24.2006

By DENISE GRADY A poet and artist has enlisted the help of scientists and engineering students to create a "seeing machine" that may eventually help people like her, with severely impaired vision, to read, look at pictures and explore landscapes and buildings. Elizabeth Goldring's eyesight has come and gone over the years. Mostly, it has gone. Now 61, she has had juvenile diabetes since college, and the disease has pecked away at her vision, causing hemorrhages in her retinas, the fragile layer of light-sensitive cells at the back of the eye. About 10 years ago, when she was nearly blind in both eyes, her doctor recommended a test to find out whether she had any healthy retina left at all. The test involved a large $100,000 machine called a scanning laser ophthalmoscope, which would let the doctor examine her retinas and project images directly onto them. If there were any live spots, the device might let her see. It worked. She saw a stick-figure turtle. Ms. Goldring, a poet who has had three books published, asked to see a word. She was able to read "sun." It was the first word she had seen in many months. "For a poet, that's an incredible feeling," she said. "I said almost immediately, 'I need to get in touch with the man who invented this machine.' " Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Vision
Link ID: 8956 - Posted: 05.24.2006

Michael Hopkin Clinical researchers have discovered that they can rouse semi-comatose patients by giving them, bizarrely, a common sleeping drug. If more wide-ranging tests are successful, the drug could become the first effective treatment for 'persistent vegetative state', the condition at the centre of the US legal battle over sufferer Terri Schiavo last year. British and South African doctors have reported the cases of three semi-comatose patients who were revived for several hours at a time by zolpidem, marketed to millions of insomniacs under the brand name Ambien. The drug allows the semi-comatose patients to talk with friends and family for several hours before the effect wears off, they report in the journal NeuroRehabilitation1. The patients, two of whom suffered severe head injuries in motor accidents and a third who was left brain damaged by a near-drowning incident, have been taking the pills every day for several years, with no severe side effects. "The effect is amazing to say the least," says Ralf Clauss of the Royal Surrey County Hospital in Guildford, UK, who discovered it along with his colleague Wally Nel of the Family Practice in Pollack Park, Springs, South Africa. "They can interact, make jokes and speak on the phone." One of them even mastered catching a baseball. ©2006 Nature Publishing Group

Keyword: Sleep
Link ID: 8955 - Posted: 06.24.2010