COLUMBUS, Ohio – Scientists have learned how a genetic variation long suspected in making some people susceptible to alcoholism and narcotic drug addiction actually does so. In laboratory studies, this variation greatly reduced the amount of protein that the DNA in a cell produced. It's the difference in protein expression that may make receptors on certain brain cells much more vulnerable to the effects of addictive drugs, said Wolfgang Sadee, the study's lead author, professor and chair of pharmacology and director of the pharmacogenomics program at Ohio State University. These particular receptors, called mu opioid receptors, serve as a molecular docking station for narcotic drugs and alcohol. Until now it wasn't clear exactly what about this genetic variation, called A118G, would increase a person's chances of developing a drug addiction. (A118G is a variation in what researchers call the mu opioid receptor gene.) While Sadee and his team didn't look at the interaction between narcotics and the mu opioid receptor, they suspect that differences in protein production may leave brain cells with these receptors more open to the effects of drugs. “The real significance of this work is that one day, we may be able to tailor treatments for addiction based on how a person's genes behave,” said Sadee, who is also chair of pharmacology at Ohio State. The study appears in the current issue of the Journal of Biological Chemistry.

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 7955 - Posted: 06.24.2010

For decades paleontologists have assumed that early primates rested by day and fed by night. But a new study of light-sensing proteins suggests that the first primates' eyes were better suited for daytime and that only later did some shift their activities to the night. If that's the case, then primates have always been adapted to looking for food and shelter during the day and didn't have to develop this capability as they diversified. Modern primates can be either diurnal or nocturnal, but the most primitive ones--such as bushbabies--are night owls. They have a special lining behind their retina for concentrating light, which is useful for night foraging. Some species that are active in the day also have this lining, suggesting that ancestral primates were night-dwellers, with some primates later evolving daytime routines. Wen-Hsuing Li, a molecular evolutionary biologist at the University of Chicago, and colleagues examined the molecular evidence for this scenario. They compared the DNA sequence of genes for light-sensitive proteins--called opsins--from species widely distributed on the primate tree. For one analysis, they looked at DNA from 25 species, concentrating on the genes for pigments sensitive to green or red wavelengths, which are not useful at night. If ancestral primates were nocturnal, then these genes should vary among living species, because mutations wouldn't have compromised survival. They found the opposite: The red and green pigment genes were quite similar across species. © 2005 by the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Keyword: Evolution; Vision
Link ID: 7954 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Loss of body mass over time appears to be strongly linked to older adults’ risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease (AD), and the greater the loss the greater the chance of a person developing the disease, new research has found. The findings are the first to associate decline in body mass index (BMI) with the eventual onset of AD. The researchers suggest that the loss of body mass reflects disease processes and that change in BMI might be a clinical predictor of the development of AD. The research, reported in the September 27, 2005, issue of Neurology, was conducted by Aron S. Buchman, M.D., David A. Bennett, M.D., and colleagues at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, IL, as part of the Religious Orders Study. The Religious Orders Study is a comprehensive, long-term look at aging and AD among Catholic nuns, priests, and brothers nationwide that has been funded by the National Institute on Aging (NIA), a component of the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, since 1993. Rush University Medical Center is one of more than 30 Alzheimer’s Disease Centers supported by the NIA. “People with Alzheimer’s disease are known to lose weight and body mass after they have the disease,” says Dallas W. Anderson, Ph.D., program director for population studies in the Dementias of Aging Branch of NIA’s Neuroscience and Neuropsychology of Aging Program. “This study is significant in that it looks at body mass changes in the years preceding dementia and cognitive decline. Other studies have looked at BMI at only one point in time or studied body mass loss in people who already have AD.”

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 7953 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News — Zoo animals often seem to ignore the presence of human visitors, but new research suggests that is not always the case for captive gorillas, which repeatedly become agitated and anxious when large numbers of people approach their exhibit. The research, published in the current journal Applied Animal Behavior Science, is the first analysis on the influence of visitors on the behavior and welfare of zoo-housed gorillas. "We noticed more behaviors suggestive of relaxation, such as increased resting, during low visitor density, and more behaviors suggestive of agitation, such as repetitive rocking, group-directed aggression and self-grooming during high visitor density," said the study's author, Deborah L. Wells. Wells, a senior lecturer in the School of Psychology at Queen's University Belfast, Ireland, explained to Discovery News that she studied six western lowland gorillas housed together at Belfast Zoological Gardens in Northern Ireland. The gorilla group includes both wild-born and captive-born males and females of different ages. The gorillas were observed for four hours a day on 20 busy days, when the average number of visitors was around 1,288. The gorillas also were observed on 20 quiet days, usually on weekdays when an average of six people visited the zoo. © 2005 Discovery Communications Inc.

Keyword: Stress; Animal Rights
Link ID: 7952 - Posted: 06.24.2010

In a significant advance toward understanding a perplexing and painful neurological disorder, an international team of researchers has discovered gene mutations associated with an inherited chronic pain and weakness syndrome known as hereditary neuralgic amyotrophy (also called HNA). No treatment is known for this disabling condition, which short-circuits a peripheral nerve center called the brachial plexus, a network of over 100,000 nerves, that branches from the spinal cord to supply muscular function and sensation to the shoulders, arms, and hands. HNA may first appear in the childhood or teen years, and lead to recurring episodes of severe, sudden onset pain in the arms and shoulders as well as weakness, loss of sensation, and muscle wasting. Episodes are often triggered by an infection, an immunization, childbirth, or overworking the arms and shoulders. Nerve inflammation and changes in the blood suggest that problems with the person's immune response are contributing to the episode. The on again/off again course of the condition, and the environmental triggers, are unusual among inherited nerve disorders. An associated aspect of the disorder in some individuals is facial features -- a long, slender face and narrow, close-set eyes slanting upward -- reminiscent of portraits by the early 20th-century Italian painter Modigliani, according to Phillip F. Chance, MD, professor of pediatrics and neurology at the University of Washington in Seattle, whose laboratory first located the gene for this disorder to chromosome 17 in 1996.

Keyword: Pain & Touch; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 7951 - Posted: 09.27.2005

By HENRY FOUNTAIN YESTERDAY, as on other fall Saturdays, student musicians around the country performed in their school marching bands, revving up football fans with classics like "When the Saints Go Marching In" and the theme from "Hawaii Five-O." Yet from the standpoint of their hearing, they were only slightly better off than if they had been jackhammering the parking lot. A study at Duke University has confirmed what musicians and band directors have known anecdotally for years: playing in a marching band can be hazardous to your health. Joseph Keefe, a Duke graduate who works with an acoustical consulting firm in New Jersey, measured sound pressure levels experienced by band members at Duke and at a local high school in Durham, N.C. At indoor and outdoor rehearsals and during games, he often found levels above 100 decibels for drummers and other percussionists, and for anyone unfortunate enough to march near brass instruments. While that might not be as noisy as a construction site, which can produce levels of about 110 decibels, band performances can be noisy enough to threaten at least temporary hearing loss. "Plenty loud is a good way to put it," Mr. Keefe said. A marching band is loud enough that, over the course of a rehearsal or game, it can exceed workplace recommendations by the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, which are based on both noise level and time of exposure. At a typical football game, between warming up, and playing in the stands and the halftime show, band members can be exposed to loud music for several hours, said Mr. Keefe, who played the drums in the Duke band. Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Hearing
Link ID: 7950 - Posted: 09.26.2005

By Rob Stein Are left-handed women at increased risk for breast cancer? A new study suggests that might be the case. Cuno Uiterwaal of the University Medical Center in the Netherlands and colleagues examined the relationship between handedness and breast cancer in 12,178 healthy, middle-age women from Utrecht participating in a breast cancer screening study. Between 1982 and 2000, the left-handed women in the study were more than twice as likely as right-handed women to develop breast cancer before going through menopause, the researchers found. The association held up even after the researchers took into account other factors, such as social and economic status, smoking habits, family history of breast cancer, and reproductive history. Much more research is needed to explore whether the relationship is real and what may explain it. But the researchers speculated that left-handed women may be at risk for breast cancer because they were exposed to higher levels of certain hormones in the womb. © Copyright 1996-2005 The Washington

Keyword: Laterality; Hormones & Behavior
Link ID: 7949 - Posted: 06.24.2010

John Roach for National Geographic News By the time babies celebrate their first birthday, their ears are already tuned to the rhythms and sounds of their culture, researchers say. The finding suggests that one-year-olds in North America, for example, notice subtle changes in waltz-like rhythms but not in the complex dance rhythms unique to other continents. The study builds on research reported earlier this year that shows six-month-old babies are more adept at recognizing complex musical rhythms than adults. Scientist described the latest findings last month in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "In the most recent study, by 12 months of age babies are showing signs of tuning to the music of their culture," said Sandra Trehub, a psychologist at the University of Toronto at Mississauga who co-authored both studies. Trehub and colleagues added 12-month-old infants to their mix of test subjects as part of an ongoing effort to chart how human brains develop over time. While the study found that year-old babies tune into the rhythms of their own musical heritage, the infants still have a better ear than adults for the complex rhythms unique to foreign music. © 1996-2005 National Geographic Society.

Keyword: Development of the Brain; Hearing
Link ID: 7948 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Antwerp, Belgium – Neuralgic Amyotrophy is a painful disorder of the peripheral nervous system. This heritable disease causes prolonged acute attacks of pain in the shoulder or arm, followed by temporary paralysis. Researchers from the Flanders Interuniversity Institute for Biotechnology (VIB) connected to the University of Antwerp, have uncovered a small piece of the molecular puzzle of this disease by identifying the defects in the gene responsible for this disorder. Hereditary Neuralgic Amyotrophy (HNA) is characterized by repeated attacks of pain in a shoulder, arm, and/or hand, followed by total or partial paralysis of the affected area. The pain and the loss of movement usually disappear within a couple of weeks, but sometimes recovery can take months or even several years. Many HNA patients also have particular facial features, such as eyes that are somewhat closer together, a fold in the upper eyelid that covers the inside corner of the eye, and sometimes a cleft palate. HNA is a relatively rare disorder: the disease appears in some 200 families worldwide. There is also a non-hereditary form of HNA, called the Parsonage-Turner Syndrome. The clinical picture of this more frequently occurring form - 2 to 4 cases per 100,000 persons - is not distinguishable from that of the heritable form. The attacks of pain are usually provoked by external factors such as vaccination, infection, operation, and even pregnancy or childbirth. By virtue of their genetic predisposition, carriers of the hereditary form of HNA run greater risk of having an attack.

Keyword: Genes & Behavior; Pain & Touch
Link ID: 7947 - Posted: 06.24.2010

WASHINGTON -- Two recent studies may help clinicians and researchers better predict and understand dementia of the Alzheimer's type early in its history. Both studies appear in the September issue of Neuropsychology, which is published by the American Psychological Association (APA). Psychologists focus on early detection in part because current medications are useful only when given very early in the course of the disease. In the first study, psychologists Pauline Spaan, PhD, and Jeroen Raaijmakers, PhD, from the University of Amsterdam in collaboration with neurologist Cees Jonker, MD, PhD, from the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam analyzed the data on 119 participants in the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam, a large, population-based study of older people. The researchers visited older people in their homes and gave them memory tests loaded on laptop computers. Two years later, they compared the test scores of people who went on to develop Alzheimer's with the scores of those who stayed healthy. The researchers analyzed memory components that included episodic (what happened; what did you hear or read); semantic (vocabulary, facts); and implicit (learning without awareness of learning, "priming"). Three tests were very good at predicting who would develop Alzheimer's by two years later. Participants for whom "priming" information didn't aid memory or whose learning wasn't aided by semantic knowledge -- were significantly more likely to develop Alzheimer's.

Keyword: Alzheimers; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 7946 - Posted: 09.26.2005

Susan Milius Honeybees that defend their colonies by killing wasps with body heat come within 5°C of cooking themselves in the process, according to a study in China. At least two species of honeybees there, the native Apis cerana and the introduced European honeybee, Apis mellifera, engulf a wasp in a living ball of defenders and heat the predator to death. A new study of heat balling has described a margin of safety for the defending bees, says Tan Ken of Yunnan Agricultural University in Kunming, China. He and his team also report in an upcoming issue of Naturwissenschaften that the native bees have heat-balling tricks that the European bees don't. That makes sense, the researchers say, since the Asian bees have long shared their range with the attacker wasp Vespa velutina, but the European bees became widespread in Asia only some 50 years ago and so have had much less time to adapt to the wasp. The attacker wasps are "gigantic," says Thomas Seeley of Cornell University, who studies bee behavior. Of all social insects, the species has the largest workers, with wingspans that can stretch 5 centimeters. The wasps build large versions of the papery nests of hornets found in North America, and they specialize in breaking into other social-insect nests and carrying off larvae as food for young wasps. ©2005 Science Service.

Keyword: Miscellaneous; Evolution
Link ID: 7945 - Posted: 06.24.2010

CHAPEL HILL -- New research from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine points to the possible molecular origin of at least nine human diseases of nervous system degeneration. The findings are currently in PLoS Computational Biology, an open-access journal published by the Public Library of Science (PloS) in partnership with the International Society for Computational Biology. These neurodegenerative diseases, including Huntington's disease, share an abnormal deposit of proteins inside nerve cells. This deposition of protein results from a kind of genetic stutter within the cell's nucleus asking for multiple copies of the amino acid glutamine, a building block of protein structure. These disorders are collectively known as polyglutamine diseases. Along with Huntington's, these diseases include spinobulbar muscular atrophy; spinocerebellar ataxia types 1, 2, 3, 6, 7 and 17; and dentatorubral-pallidoluysian atrophy, or Haw River Syndrome. Haw River Syndrome is a genetic brain disorder first identified in 1998 in five generations of a family having ancestors born in Haw River, N.C. The disorder begins in adolescence (between ages 15 and 30 years) and is characterized by progressive and widespread damage to brain function, leading to loss of coordination, seizures, paranoid delusions, dementia and death within 15 to 20 years.

Keyword: Huntingtons
Link ID: 7944 - Posted: 09.24.2005

Patients with panic disorder have nearly double the risk for coronary heart disease, and those also diagnosed with depression are at almost three times the risk, according to new research. The study in the current issue of Psychosomatic Medicine focuses on the medical histories of nearly 40,000 people from the time they were first diagnosed as suffering from panic disorder. Lead author Andres Gomez-Caminero, Ph.D., says the large cohort study "highlights, for the first time, the potential for additive effects of different psychiatric conditions on cardiovascular health….and it really sets the foundation for new research in the area of cardiovascular risk estimation among patients with mental illness." The report focuses on medical histories from a database of 17 million patients jointly maintained by 30 managed care providers. Panic disorder involves unexpected and repeated episodes of intense fear accompanied by physical symptoms including chest pain, heart palpitations, shortness of breath, dizziness or abdominal distress. Panic disorder patients are more likely to be female, overweight, smokers and have a history of depression. About 2.4 million Americans annually experience panic episodes, and the manifestations often mimic symptoms of a heart attack. The disorder can be treated by medications and psychotherapy.

Keyword: Neuroimmunology
Link ID: 7943 - Posted: 09.24.2005

What was being looking at? The researchers were aiming to transfer as much of a human chromosome into a mouse embryonic stem cell as possible. Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes which contain all human genes. Males and females share 22 of these chromosome pairs; the 23rd is the sex chromosome, where women have two X chromosomes and men have one X and one Y. Down's syndrome belongs to a class of disorders known as aneuploidies in which individuals have the wrong number of chromosomes. Scientists do not know why these extra copies occur. Aneuploidies occur in at least 5% of all pregnancies and are a significant cause of illness, death and miscarriage. People with Down's are born with three copies of chromosome 21. There are an estimated 60,000 people in the UK who have Down's syndrome. They can expect to live between 40 and 60 years. What has been achieved? The researchers, led by Victor Tybulewicz at the National Institute for Medical Research and Professor Elizabeth Fisher from the Institute if Neurology at University College London, were able to add about 90% of human chromosome 21 - which contains around 250 genes - into the embryonic stem cells of mice. They did this by extracting all chromosomes from a human cell. These were then squirted onto mouse embryonic stem cells, each of which will absorb one chromosome at random. Stem cells that took up chromosome 21 were then isolated and injected into mouse embryos. These were then replaced in the mother, whose offspring were shown to have the extra copy of chromosome 21, which also had problems with memory, in brain function and in the formation of the heart, similar to those that can occur in people with Down syndrome. (C)BBC

Keyword: Development of the Brain; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 7942 - Posted: 09.23.2005

Scientists have been able to introduce most of a human chromosome into mice - and create the most successful recreation of Down's syndrome so far. The Medical Research Council hopes the step will help research into Down's and other chromosomal conditions. They say it is a significant technical development, as it had previously been possible to place only fragments of chromosomes into mouse cells. The research is published in the magazine Science. A person with Down's has three copies of chromosome 21, instead of the normal two. It belongs to a class of disorders known as aneuploidies in which individuals have the wrong number of chromosomes. Scientists do not know why these extra copies occur. Aneuploidies occur in at least 5% of all pregnancies and are a significant cause of illness, death and miscarriage. Less well known aneuploidies are Edward's syndrome, where there are three copies of chromosome 18 and Patau's syndrome, where an extra copy of chromosome 13 is present. Both prove fatal in early childhood. In this research, led by Victor Tybulewicz at the National Institute for Medical Research and Professor Elizabeth Fisher from the Institute if Neurology at University College London, were able to add about 90% of the 250 genes on human chromosome 21 into the embryonic stem cells of mice. They then used these cells to generate a strain of mice that carried the extra human chromosome. This new strain of mice has been shown to have problems with memory, in brain function and in the formation of the heart, similar to those that can occur in people with Down syndrome. (C)BBC

Keyword: Genes & Behavior; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 7941 - Posted: 09.23.2005

It is best to treat stammering as early as possible, ideally before a child starts school, researchers say. About one in 20 children begin to stammer, usually between the ages of two and four. University of Sydney researchers tested a new treatment - the Lidcombe programme - specifically designed for pre-school children. Their British Medical Journal study found it was more effective than relying on natural recovery. Around 80% of children who develop a stammer do recover spontaneously. As a result, there has been doubt about whether therapy has a positive impact - or is simply being used on children who would recover naturally anyway. The new study is the first to provide hard evidence that therapy does have a positive effect. In total 54 children aged three to six took part, of which just over half received the Lidcombe programme. Each child was diagnosed with a frequency of at least 2% syllables stammered. After nine months the children who received the Lidcombe programme had reduced their level of stammering by 77%, and 52% had reduced their stammering to 1% of syllables. In the control group, just 43% had reduced their stammering, and only 15% had achieved the target of stammering on 1% of syllables. However, the researchers say the programme seems to be less effective once children had reached school age. They argue that delaying treatment until then risks exposing children to serious social and psychological effects. "If the disorder persists into the school age years a child is exposed to unacceptable risk of experiencing the disabling effects of chronic and intractable stuttering throughout life." (C)BBC

Keyword: Language; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 7940 - Posted: 09.23.2005

By Juliet Eilperin Women in coastal communities have twice as much mercury in their blood as those living inland, according to an analysis by an Environmental Protection Agency scientist. The preliminary findings, based on a survey of 3,600 women conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention between 1999 and 2002, provide fresh evidence of the link between fish consumption and concentrations of methylmercury, a neurotoxin that causes developmental problems in young children. The study focused on the 10 percent of women with the highest mercury levels, and in that group, it found that inland residents had an average level of 2.4 parts per billion, compared with 5.9 parts per billion for coastal residents. EPA guidelines hold that mercury levels higher than 3.5 parts per billion pose a possible health threat. Mercury, spewed into the air in emissions from power plants and other sources, ends up in water and accumulates in predator fish such as tuna and swordfish. In pregnant women with high levels, methylmercury crosses the placenta and can affect the developing brain of the fetus. "What's evident in these data is there's a real difference between the coastal and non-coastal" women, said Kathryn Mahaffey, who conducted the analysis as director of the EPA's division of exposure assessment, coordination and policy. "The message is people need to eat a variety of foods and, when choosing fish species, they need to choose more than one type of fish." © Copyright 1996-2005 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Neurotoxins; Autism
Link ID: 7939 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Jennifer Wild When it comes to working out the relationships between ancient languages, grammar is more enlightening than vocabulary, scientists say. There are some 300 language families in the world today. Researchers have long studied similarities between the words in different languages to try to work out how they are related. But the rate of change in languages means that this method really only works back to 10,000 years ago. Homo sapiens evolved more than a hundred thousand years ago and by 10,000 years ago had already settled around the globe. So researchers are keen to peer further back in time to see how language evolved and spread. To do this, Michael Dunn and colleagues at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics in Germany decided to look at grammar. They took Papuan languages of people in the South Pacific as their challenge. Radiocarbon dating shows humans lived more than 35,000 years ago in Melanesia, a group of islands including Papua New Guinea. But the 23 languages that have evolved in this area share few, if any, common words. So the standard techniques cannot reveal much about the languages' histories. The researchers made a database of 125 grammatical features in 15 Papuan languages. This included how word types, such as nouns and verbs, are ordered in a sentence, and whether nouns have a gender, as they do in languages such as German and French. ©2005 Nature Publishing Group

Keyword: Language
Link ID: 7938 - Posted: 06.24.2010

(Newark)-Psychology researchers have long understood and accepted the importance of an individual's brain activity in motor areas when interpreting the actions of others. However, much less was known about the role the body plays in helping individuals process and understand the same information. With the help of two patients suffering from an extremely rare degenerative neurological condition, a Rutgers-Newark Psychology Professor and his team of researchers have established that the body plays a significant role in helping humans to perceive and understand the actions of others. In the article, "Understanding Another's Expectation from Action: The Role of Peripheral Sensation," that will appear in the October 2005 issue of Nature Neuroscience, Rutgers-Newark Psychology Professor Guenther Knoblich is among a group of researchers who contend that individuals use the human body's senses to understand others actions and expectations. The researchers reached this conclusion by performing experiments with two individuals suffering from the rare neurological disorder of selective and complete haptic deafferentiation due to sensory neuronopathy. The participants are the only two known individuals in the world whose sense of touch and body movement was completely eradicated by the degenerative disease. The individuals participated in tasks that tested their ability to gauge the weight of boxes which were lifted by other individuals and their ability to infer weight expectations of the observed individuals. Their performance was compared against a control group comprised of healthy individuals.

Keyword: Pain & Touch
Link ID: 7937 - Posted: 09.23.2005

US researchers claim to have developed a brain scanning technique reliable enough to identify when criminals lie. The University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia, team say monitoring the frontal lobe area of the brain shows when people are lying. Nature magazine reports the scientists say the area is more active when people are not telling the truth. But other experts said laboratory research would not translate to real-life situations. The researchers use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scans to look at which areas of the brain were active in particular circumstances. In the study, which is also set to be published in the journal Neuroscience, volunteers were given an envelope with two cards and $20. They were told they could keep money if they lied convincingly in tests. Once inside the fMRI scanner, they were asked to press a button if cards flashed up on a screen in front of them matched one they had. They were asked to lie about having one of the cards, and be honest about the other. The scientists say that, by analysing brain activity, they were able to develop a mathematical formula that could detect lies from truth which was 99% accurate. Daniel Langleben, who led the research, had previously said fMRI was a research tool, and could not be used to spot people lying in criminal or terrorist investigations. But he said this latest study had changed his mind because it looked at results from an individual lie, rather than looking at generic brain activity when people were being dishonest. He told Nature: "We can't say whether this person will one day use a bomb. (C)BBC

Keyword: Stress
Link ID: 7936 - Posted: 09.22.2005