Gaia Vince Complex decisions are best left to your unconscious mind to work out, according to a new study, and over-thinking a problem could lead to expensive mistakes. The research suggests the conscious mind should be trusted only with simple decisions, such as selecting a brand of oven glove. Sleeping on a big decision, such as buying a car or house, is more likely to produce a result people remain happy with than consciously weighing up the pros and cons of the problem, the researchers say. Thinking hard about a complex decision that rests on multiple factors appears to bamboozle the conscious mind so that people only consider a subset of information, which they weight inappropriately, resulting in an unsatisfactory choice. In contrast, the unconscious mind appears able to ponder over all the information and produce a decision that most people remain satisfied with Ap Dijksterhuis at the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands, and colleagues recruited 80 people for a series of lab-based and “real-world” tests. The participants were provided with information and asked to make decisions about simple and complex purchases, ranging from shampoos to furniture to cars. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Sleep; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 8549 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By ANDREW POLLACK The Food and Drug Administration said yesterday that it would allow some patients in a clinical trial to resume treatment with Tysabri, a multiple sclerosis drug that was abruptly withdrawn from the market a year ago because of safety risks. The decision appears to strengthen the probability that Tysabri, developed by Biogen Idec and Elan, will be allowed to return to the market. The F.D.A. is scheduled to decide on that question by the end of March. "You can certainly deduce that we've concluded that there are at least some people for whom the risk is worth it," Dr. Robert Temple, director of medical policy for the drug division of F.D.A., said in an interview. Still, he said, the decision yesterday was to allow the drug to be used only under the controlled conditions of a clinical trial and only by patients who had previously benefited from it in a clinical trial. "That's not at all the same as making it available for marketing," he said. Shares of Biogen gained $1.34 on the news, closing at $45.72, an increase of 3 percent. Shares of Elan rose 44 cents, or 3.1 percent, to close at $14.54. Tysabri, considered a big advance in treatment, was approved in November 2004 and withdrawn from the market by its manufacturers three months later after two patients developed a rare brain disease and one of them died. A third case of the disease, also fatal, was later discovered to have occurred in a patient who had taken the drug in a clinical trial for Crohn's disease. Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Multiple Sclerosis
Link ID: 8548 - Posted: 02.16.2006

By SETH MYDANS PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — Mao Irang is an evangelist for the new magic in Cambodia, a treatment that can cure everything from headaches to blackouts to nightmares to bursts of violence. A Khmer Rouge fighter guarding Cambodians forced into farm labor. In 1975-79, during the Khmer Rouge's reign, 1.7 million died through execution, starvation or overwork, and the psychological trauma persists today. "I ask my friends, 'What is your problem?' " she said. " 'Does your food get stuck in your throat? Do you have pain here, and here, and here? Do you have problems with your sleep?' I say, 'O.K., try this doctor.' " Her doctor is Ka Sunbunaut, one of only 26 psychiatrists in this nation of 12 million traumatized people, the survivors and the children of survivors of one of the past century's most horrifying episodes of mass killing. After therapy with him, said Ms. Mao Irang, 35, a social worker tormented by her memories, "I felt like I was another person; I was not a prisoner anymore." She was liberated through a combination of talk therapy and psychiatric drugs — treatments that are largely alien to Cambodians, who often turn to faith healers and herbalists. But the word is spreading now among a relatively small circle of educated people: your ailments have a cause, and there are treatments that can help you. Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Depression
Link ID: 8547 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Patricia Yollin, Chronicle Staff Writer It was time for the annual Valentine's Day sex tour at the San Francisco Zoo, but none of the permanent residents got the memo. As human voyeurs learned about the torrid world of amorous beasts, most of the animals barely glanced at each other. "The wind seems to unnerve them," said Jane Tollini, inventor of the tour that has been copied by zoos throughout North America. "And they had a busy weekend." They did indeed. Tollini, former penguin keeper at the zoo, led excursions Saturday and Sunday and will do the same this weekend. She came up with the idea 17 years ago. "I like to watch," Tollini said. Even though there wasn't much to see on Tuesday, there was plenty to hear about. "This is the most tacky, tasteless, smutty, down-in-the-gutter tour ever created," Tollini told the 80 or so adults who piled onto two trams and devoted three hours to tales of fornicating felines and hermaphrodite ostriches. "Animals do everything we do, but they do it a little differently," said Tollini, draped in a pink boa with pink hearts. "The only thing I couldn't find was cross-dressing."

Keyword: Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 8546 - Posted: 02.16.2006

RESTON, Va.—Using both brain function (PET) and anatomical structure (MR) imaging studies, Italian researchers—within the context of an Italian-British collaboration—discovered that degenerative and dysfunctional events occur in individuals many years before the onset of Huntington’s disease—particularly in the brain’s white matter—an area not previously considered primarily involved with the disease. In fact, the brain’s white matter “progressively reduced” as individuals approached the first disease symptoms, according to a study published in February’s Journal of Nuclear Medicine. “Our observations—made by analyzing the results of the largest group of subjects studied to date—may suggest new methodologies and drug trials for therapy,” said Ferdinando Squitieri, M.D., Ph.D., who works in the Neurogenetics Unit and Centre for Rare Diseases of IRCCS Neuromed in Pozzilli, Isernia, Italy. “It is possible to approach the disease at the presymptomatic stage by monitoring the brain tissue volumes and the basal ganglia and cortex dysfunction. If so, we may be able to prevent Huntington’s disease before onset symptoms by using proper drugs,” added the co-author of “Brain White-Matter Volume Loss and Glucose Hypometabolism Precede the Clinical Symptoms of Huntington’s Disease.” Copyright © 2006 SNM

Keyword: Huntingtons; Glia
Link ID: 8545 - Posted: 06.24.2010

A molecule in the brain essential for wakefulness and appetite has been found to play a central role in strengthening the neuron connections that lead to addiction. The discovery of how the neuropeptide orexin works at the molecular level makes it a strong new target for potential drugs to treat addiction, the researchers say. The discovery by neuroscientists at UCSF's Ernest Gallo Clinic and Research Center is being reported February 16 in the journal Neuron. The research focused on orexin's role in strengthening communication between neurons that release dopamine, a brain chemical central to learning and memory. The strengthened communication is known to play a key role in the experience of a drug high and subsequent drug craving. Orexin is produced in the brain's lateral hypothalmus (LH) region. The scientists demonstrated in studies of rats that orexin acutely enhances the ability of receptors at dopamine neuron synapses – known as NMDA receptors – to promote the release of dopamine. They showed that orexin creates a long-lasting potential for strengthened transmission between neurons of the LH region and dopamine-releasing neurons in a brain region known as the ventral tegmental area (VTA). This fundamental change in the neurons, called synaptic plasticity, is known to be critical for new learning and memory formation essential to addiction.

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Sleep
Link ID: 8544 - Posted: 06.24.2010

The medication tetrabenazine cut down involuntary movement in patients with Huntington’s disease on average by about 25 percent, with many patients experiencing a greater improvement, according to a study in the February 14 issue of the journal Neurology. Overall, patients who received the medication were six times as likely to be considered by their doctors to have improved considerably, compared to participants who received a placebo. Dr. Kathleen M. Shannon, neurologist and Huntington’s disease specialist at the Huntington’s Disease Society of America Center of Excellence at Rush University Medical Center, led the Rush study. Rush was one of 16 sites to participate in the randomized, controlled study which involved 84 patients. Tetrabenazin is available in Europe and Canada – but not the United States, but is currently being reviewed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. If approved, the medication would be the first authorized by the agency expressly for the treatment of Huntington’s disease, which affects about 30,000 people in the United States. “Huntington’s disease is an inherited brain disorder that causes patients to experience uncontrollable jerky movements (chorea), as well as changes in personality, behavior, thinking and memory. There are no FDA-approved treatments for the chorea. Anti-psychotic drugs like haloperidol (Haldol) are commonly used to suppress chorea, but they cause many different side effects. This study shows that tetrabenazine can decrease chorea, and the drug is well-tolerated by most research subjects,” said Shannon. ©2004 Rush University Medical Center,

Keyword: Huntingtons
Link ID: 8543 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News — Appreciation for sweet tastes is hard wired into the brains of most insects and animals, including humans, according to a recent study. Since the study also determined that our brains have a built-in aversion to bitter substances, chocolate would appear to be a neutral food, but its sweetness usually wins people over, even when the chocolate is dark and slightly bitter. "There is a fine balance between bitter and sweet," said Kristin Scott, who led the study, which was published in a recent issue of Neuron. "Even fruitflies will eat bitter substances if the ratio of sugar is high. Coffee drinking is definitely an acquired taste." For the study, Scott and her colleagues monitored the taste responses of the fruit fly Drosophila. Walter Fischler, who assisted in the research, explained to Discovery News that "sometimes nature finds the same solution for the same problem in many different species. Humans have cells that are specialized for certain tastes on the tongue, and these cells could be somewhat mirrored in the brain, similar to how they are in flies." The researchers found that sweet substances activated certain brain neurons called Gr5a. Bitter substances activated different neurons, called Gr66a. Repeatedly, the flies preferred substances that activated the Gr5a neurons, but they avoided consumables that activated Gr66a neurons. © 2006 Discovery Communications Inc.

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste); Obesity
Link ID: 8542 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Helen Pearson Loud noise appears to fuel the effects of the club-drug ecstasy in the brain. The results add to the debate about the risks of long-term brain damage from the drug. Ecstasy is the common name for 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA). The drug, popular at raves and nightclubs, triggers a flood of the feel-good chemical serotonin in the brain, causing feelings of euphoria, energy and well-being. Michelangelo Iannone at the Institute of Neurological Science in Catanzaro, Italy, and his colleagues tested whether loud noise intensified ecstasy's effects in rat brains. After injecting the animals with either a low or high dose of MDMA, they played them a buzz of white noise at the maximum volume allowed in Italian nightclubs. They measured the rats' brain activity using electrodes inserted into the animals' skulls. The deafening noise can transform a seemingly innocuous dose of the drug into a potent one, they found. The low dose of MDMA had little effect on the animals' brains - but when paired with the noise, it boosted the activity of certain brain cells. "This may make the difference between the drug being toxic and not," says Jenny Morton at the University of Cambridge, UK, who has studied the effects of music on drugs. ©2006 Nature Publishing Group

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Hearing
Link ID: 8541 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Alison Motluk A new weight loss drug that works by blocking a cannabinoid receptor in the brain has had “modest” success at helping people both lose weight and keep it off, researchers say. It also seemed to improve other risk factors for cardiovascular disease beyond what would be expected from weight loss alone. But critics say the study’s methodology may have been flawed, given that almost half of its participants dropped out. Although 3045 people entered the study, the main results were based only on the 1602 who followed through to the end of the first year. “That may erroneously create a larger effect,” says Denise Simons-Morton, at the US National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, who co-wrote an accompanying editorial about the paper. She and her co-authors suggest the researchers should have made a greater effort to measure final outcomes in all their participants, even those who left early. Xavier Pi-Sunyer, of St Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital in New York, and his colleagues randomised their obese participants to take daily doses of either 5 milligrams or 20 mg of the drug, called rimonabant, or a placebo. The volunteers were also encouraged to stay on a weight-loss diet and given instruction on how to exercise more. Over the course of a year, various measures were taken, including weight, waist circumference, triglycerides (blood lipids), good cholesterol and blood pressure. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Obesity; Drug Abuse
Link ID: 8540 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Scientists have devised a probe which can warn if a baby is being deprived of oxygen during birth. It checks for high levels of a chemical called hypoxanthine. The University of Warwick researchers hope it could reduce Caesareans, as doctors currently opt for the operation if there is any doubt at all. Experts said such a test could have huge benefits - but warned much more work was needed before the Warwick probe could be used in hospitals. Current tests for foetal hypoxia - oxygen deprivation - are unreliable and many experts feel they are not specific enough. Not only does this mean that any baby thought to be at any risk is delivered by Caesarean - potentially unecessarily - but they are also given head cooling treatment, which has been shown to minimise the risk of damage from oxygen deprivation. Experts are looking for better ways of targeting the treatment. Professor Nick Dale, the neuroscientist who has led the Warwick research, looked at levels of a chemical in the blood called hypoxanthine. It has been known for some time that high levels indicate a high risk of a child being starved of oxygen - with a measure of more than five micromoles of the chemical per litre of blood indicating a severe risk. But the challenge is to develop a quick and easy test which can be used on the ward. (C)BBC

Keyword: Development of the Brain
Link ID: 8539 - Posted: 02.16.2006

Researchers at The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) have found that intravenous morphine used alone or with a topical anaesthetic (tetracaine) effectively reduced levels of pain in newborn infants undergoing insertion of central venous catheters (central lines). This research is reported in the February 15, 2006 issue of the journal JAMA. About 10 to 15 per cent of newborns require prolonged hospitalization for conditions such as preterm birth, congenital defects and sepsis (a blood stream infection). As part of their medical care, these infants are often exposed to multiple invasive procedures that may be painful. "It was not so long ago that infants routinely underwent painful procedures without the benefits of analgesia. Our previous studies showed that infants do feel extreme pain, that they remember this pain and that it affects their future pain responses," said Dr. Anna Taddio, the study's lead author and principal investigator, a SickKids scientist and pharmacist, and an assistant professor of Pharmacy at the University of Toronto. "Within the last decade, the pendulum started to swing in the other direction, and pain relievers began to be used more liberally in infants. However, more information was needed about the benefits and risks of the different treatment options. We undertook this study to determine the most effective way to manage pain in infants undergoing central line placements and to delineate the side effects associated with their use," said Dr. Taddio.

Keyword: Pain & Touch; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 8538 - Posted: 02.16.2006

Gay "marriage" could boost the mental and physical health of homosexuals, doctors believe. Rates of depression, drug abuse and cancer are higher in the gay community than among heterosexual people. The report said civil partnerships, which were introduced in England and Wales in December, were likely to reduce prejudice and social exclusion. The Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health article was based on previous studies in other countries. Denmark was the first country to introduce civil partnerships for same sex couples in 1989, since when several European Union countries, some US states, Australia and Canada have followed suit. Professor Michael King, of University College London, who co-wrote the article, said: "Civil partnerships are likely to break down some of the prejudice and promote greater understanding, including among staff working in the health service. "Legal civil partnerships could increase the stability of same sex relationships and minimise the social exclusion to which gay and lesbian people are often subjected." Research has shown that lesbians have higher risk of breast cancer, heart disease and obesity, while gay men have a higher risk of HIV, the article said. Gay people are also more likely to suffer from depression, drug abuse and suicidal urges than heterosexual people. (C)BBC

Keyword: Sexual Behavior; Depression
Link ID: 8537 - Posted: 02.14.2006

Where were we before we got sidetracked? It's tempting to blame cell phones, iPods and satellite radios for our distractibility, say researchers. But the more likely culprit is the aging brain. Changes in brain activity that begin gradually in middle age may explain why older adults find it hard to focus in busy environments, according to a study in this month's Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. Canadian researchers compared brain scans of adults of various ages who were given a series of memory tasks. They found that advancing age inhibited the ability to turn off background chatter and concentrate on the task at hand. "Young adults can do this really well," said lead author Cheryl Grady, senior scientist with the Rotman Research Institute at Baycrest in Toronto. "This difference becomes less distinct in middle-age adults and is even less distinct in older adults." Seeking Focus One way to cope better: Limit multi-tasking. "Multi-tasking is a colloquial expression for what we refer to as a divided-attention problem," said David Madden, professor of medical psychology at Duke University Medical Center. "When people have to divide their attention, it's harder to concentrate." © 2006 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Attention; Alzheimers
Link ID: 8536 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By SALLY SATEL, M.D. As a psychiatrist at a methadone clinic, I rarely encounter patients waving advertisements for the newest antidepressant or sleeping pill. Consumer-consciousness is just not big among our clientele. So I was surprised when a patient asked about "that pill for gambling addiction — maybe it would work for cocaine addiction, too." Ted was a 36-year-old heroin addict who stopped using once he began methadone but whose continuing cocaine habit increased in turn. Earlier that morning he heard a story on National Public Radio about a pill that helped pathological gamblers. "The gambler on the radio said the medication made him stop 'climbing the walls' and that he wasn't craving anymore," Ted told me. "That's what I need, something to make me not want." That, of course, is the timeless quest of addicts in recovery: not to want. More specifically, effortlessly not to want. But the very idea of a drug to treat addiction rankles others. Some experts are skeptical of substitution drugs, like methadone, because they produce dependence themselves. Others believe that treatment should break the addict's Pavlovian link between quick-fix relief and pill-taking. And psychotherapists often want a patient to feel the pain of his psychic conflicts in order to resolve them and thus eradicate the root cause of his addiction. Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 8535 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By ALIX SPIEGEL For most of the 20th century, therapists in America agreed on a single truth. To cure patients, it was necessary to explore and talk through the origins of their problems. In other words, they had to come to terms with the past to move forward in the present. Thousands of hours and countless dollars were spent in this pursuit. Therapists listened diligently as their patients recounted elaborate narratives of family dysfunction — the alcoholic father, the mother too absorbed in her own unhappiness to attend to her children's needs — certain that this process would ultimately produce relief. But returning to the past has fallen out of fashion among mental health professionals over the last 15 years. Research has convinced many therapists that understanding the past is not required for healing. Despite this profound change, the cliché of patients' exhaustively revisiting childhood horror stories remains. "Average consumers who walk into psychotherapy expect to be discussing their childhood and blaming their parents for contemporary problems, but that's just not true any more," said John C. Norcross, a psychology professor at the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania. Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Depression; Schizophrenia
Link ID: 8534 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By MARK DERR I was drinking coffee in the kitchen one night a few years ago when I heard, emanating from our stereo system two rooms away, the unmistakable voice of Marilyn Monroe singing "Happy Birthday, Mr. President." Startled, I asked my wife, Gina, what that recording was doing on our stereo. "You're hallucinating," she said. "That's the Grateful Dead. It's not even close to 'Happy Birthday,' much less Marilyn Monroe." I think I have seen one Marilyn Monroe movie in its entirety, and I don't recall its title. Many years ago, I saw a film clip of her performance at Madison Square Garden in celebration of President John F. Kennedy's birthday. Despite Gina's assurances, I continued to hear Marilyn singing until I walked into the next room and met the familiar sound of Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead. We concluded that I had somehow conflated the Dead's song "Uncle John's Band" with some faint music from the next-door neighbor's house and transformed the two streams of sound into something completely different. The dopamine agonist I had started taking a few months earlier for Parkinson's disease carried a warning that hallucinations were a possible side effect. It had already caused sleep attacks, so, I thought, why not hallucinations? Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Parkinsons
Link ID: 8533 - Posted: 02.14.2006

By NICHOLAS WADE When rats pause in running through a maze, they play back their memory of points along their route, but in reverse order. The discovery may provide a deep insight into how memory works in humans, as well as in rats. The reverse replay mechanism seems to be part of a neural editing process in which memories are selected, combined and stored as a set of edited movies, as it were, of important experiences in life. The mechanism was discovered by David J. Foster and Matthew A. Wilson at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology while they were studying the behavior of neurons in the rat's hippocampus, a brain region where new memories of location are formed. Their finding is reported in an article published online on Sunday by the journal Nature. The researchers were able to detect the reverse replay because of a set of electrodes that were stuck into individual neurons in the hippocampus. These neurons are known as place cells because each responds to a specific location in the rat's surroundings, in this case points along the maze. Though scientists have been aware of place cells for years, reverse replay had not been seen before because it occurs when the rats pause in the maze and seem to be doing nothing, Dr. Wilson said. Researchers had ignored this behavior because it did not seem to be important. Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 8532 - Posted: 02.14.2006

By Bjorn Carey To figure out how we pick mates, scientists have measured every shape and angle of the human face, studied the symmetry of dancers, crafted formulas from the measurements of Playboy models, and had both men and women rank attractiveness based on smelling armpit sweat. After all this and more, the rules of attraction for the human species are still not clearly understood. How it all factors into true love is even more mysterious. But a short list of scientific rules for the game of love is emerging. Some are as clearly defined as the prominent, feminine eyes of a supermodel or the desirable hips of a well-built man. Other rules work at the subconscious level, motivating us to action for evolutionary reasons that are tucked inside clouds of infatuation. In the end, lasting love depends at least as much on behavior as biology. But the first moves are made before you're even born. Starting at conception, the human body develops by neatly splitting cells. If every division were to go perfectly, the result would be a baby whose left and right sides are mirror images. But nature doesn't work that way. Genetic mutations and environmental pressures skew symmetry, a process with lifelong implications. © 2006 MSNBC.com © 2006 Microsoft

Keyword: Sexual Behavior; Hormones & Behavior
Link ID: 8531 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Seven-month-old infants cannot talk, nor can they do arithmetic. But a new study seems to show that babies do have an inherent sense of numbers, regardless of whether they can add two and two to get four. Neuroscientists Kerry Jordan and Elizabeth Brannon had previously shown that rhesus monkeys have a natural ability to match the number of voices they hear to the number of individuals they expect to see. When presented with a soundtrack of "coo" sounds, the monkeys chose to look at a picture containing the same number of fellow monkey faces. If the monkeys heard two coos, for example, they preferred to look at a picture of two monkeys rather than three and vice versa. The researchers expected the same to be true of human babies. But other studies with infants had delivered ambiguous results. Babies trained to expect to see two objects when presented with two tones stared longer at results that violated this convention, such as two tones and then three objects. And although babies matched up drumbeats and household objects in one study, efforts to duplicate the result failed. Jordan and Brannon argue that each of these studies was flawed, either because training might have skewed the response, or because the tasks were too difficult or the objects were irrelevant to a baby. © 1996-2006 Scientific American, Inc.

Keyword: Development of the Brain
Link ID: 8530 - Posted: 06.24.2010