By Janelle Miles A POPULAR treatment for jet lag may hold the key to preventing brain damage and death caused by oxygen starvation to babies during childbirth, Australian research suggests. Monash University scientists have shown giving pregnant sheep the hormone melatonin before depriving the foetus of oxygen can protect the lambs from brain damage which in human babies can result in cerebral palsy, learning difficulties and even death. The research by perinatal physiologist David Walker and others found the treatment caused no harm to the sheep or offspring. Associate Professor Walker said melatonin, secreted by the pineal gland, acted as a scavenger of free radicals, produced in the brain during periods of oxygen starvation. "Starving the brain of oxygen creates free radicals which cause cells to die," he explained. But the melatonin provided protection against brain damage after the Melbourne scientists blocked blood flow in the sheep's umbilical cords for a short period of time. Copyright 2005 News Limited.

Keyword: Hormones & Behavior
Link ID: 7043 - Posted: 03.17.2005

By SHIRLEY WON As the University of Toronto moves to end mandatory retirement at 65 for its professors and librarians, Brenda Milner says it's about time. "If you are attached to university life and the whole academic tradition, it's a little hurtful to be forced out of it just because of age," says the 86-year-old, full-time professor at Montreal's McGill University. "I know that people suffer a lot when they have to [retire] when they are still doing good work." Prof. Milner speaks from experience. A renowned professor of neuro-psychology at McGill's faculty of medicine and at the Montreal Neurological Institute, Prof. Milner says she was able to stay at work past 65 through a special concession granted by the university. Even now, she works a typical day that stretches from about 9 a.m. and ends at 6 p.m., although her hours are flexible. And about a year later, Quebec abolished its mandatory retirement law, which let her continue to stay on. "It would have been terrible" if she had had to retire, Prof. Milner says. Her work consists of a combination of lectures, research and writing.And she says she'll keep going as long as her work is "scientifically credible" and can continue to get her grants to do her research. © Copyright 2005 Bell Globemedia Publishing Inc.

Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 7042 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Primitive structures deep within the brain may have a far greater role in our high-level everyday thinking processes than previously believed, report researchers at the MIT Picower Center for Learning and Memory in the Feb. 24 issue of Nature. The results of this study led by Earl K. Miller, associate director of the Picower Center at MIT, have implications about how we learn. The new knowledge also may lead to better understanding and treatment for autism and schizophrenia, which could result from an imbalance between primitive and more advanced brain systems. Our brains have evolved a fast, reliable way to learn rules such as "stop at red" and "go at green." Dogma has it that the "big boss" lobes of the cerebral cortex, responsible for daily and long-term decision-making, learn the rules first and then transfer the knowledge to the more primitive, large forebrain region known as the basal ganglia, buried under the cortex. Although both regions are known to be involved in learning rules that become automatic enough for us to follow without much thought, no one had ever determined each one's specific role. In this study, Miller, who is the Picower Professor of Neuroscience, and postdoctoral associate Anitha Pasupathy found that in monkeys, the striatum (the input structure of the basal ganglia) showed more rapid change in the learning process than the more highly evolved prefrontal cortex. Their results suggest that the basal ganglia first identify the rule, and then "train" the prefrontal cortex, which absorbs the lesson more slowly.

Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 7041 - Posted: 03.16.2005

Minor developmental delays early in life, like beginning to walk later than average, may forecast alcoholism, according to a new study. The authors suggest that such problems with early childhood brain development may in fact contribute to the disease. The brain's cerebellum plays a crucial role in motor development and the control of fine, coordinated movements such as walking and playing musical instruments. Some researchers have proposed that the region is also involved in impulse control and that a dysfunctional cerebellum may therefore predispose to addiction. This theory led pharmacologist Ann Manzardo of the University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas City, Kansas, to ask whether variations in early motor performance might predict alcoholism later in life. To test the theory, Manzardo's team analyzed data from a well-known Danish alcoholism study that followed 330 baby boys--two thirds of whom had alcoholic fathers--through their 40s. Looking at motor development and the frequency of alcoholism in the subjects at age 30, Manzardo and her team discovered that 77% of the alcoholics had not yet been able to walk at 12 months of age, compared to 43% of nonalcoholics. Copyright © 2005 by the American Association for the Advancement of Science

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Movement Disorders
Link ID: 7040 - Posted: 06.24.2010

PITTSBURGH--Adults may feel silly when they talk to babies, but those babies will learn to speak sooner if adults talk to them like infants instead of like other adults, according to a study by Carnegie Mellon University Psychology Professor Erik Thiessen published in the March issue of the journal Infancy. Most adults speak to infants using so-called infant-directed speech: short, simple sentences coupled with higher pitch and exaggerated intonation. Researchers have long known that babies prefer to be spoken to in this manner. But Thiessen's research has revealed that infant-directed speech also helps infants learn words more quickly than normal adult speech. In a series of experiments, he and his colleagues exposed 8-month-old infants to fluent speech made up of nonsense words. The researchers assessed whether, after listening to the fluent speech for less than two minutes, infants had been able to learn the words. The infants who were exposed to fluent speech with the exaggerated intonation contour characteristic of infant-directed speech learned to identify the words more quickly than infants who heard fluent speech spoken in a more monotone fashion. Thiessen's study may also explain why many adults struggle to learn a second language even though they are able to use their own language effortlessly. Children, after all, learn to speak practically from scratch, and most experts believe infants are more adept than adults at language learning.

Keyword: Language
Link ID: 7039 - Posted: 03.16.2005

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – When you grab a piece of food and put it in your mouth, when you smile in response to the smile of a passerby or squint and grimace in anger, the complex pattern of movements that you make may be hard-wired into your brain. Scientists have long known that many of the behaviors of lower organisms are innate. In the insect world, for example, instinctive behaviors predominate. Birds have a larger repertoire of fixed behaviors than dogs. In primates, voluntary or learned behavior predominates, so neuroscientists have assumed that the hard-wiring in primate brains is limited to simple movements and complex behaviors are all learned. Now, however, studies are finding that a number of surprisingly complex behaviors appear to be built into the brains of primates as well. These are "biologically significant" behaviors that appear likely to improve the primate's ability to survive and reproduce. They include aggressive facial patterns, defensive forelimb movements, and hand-to-mouth and reaching-and-grasping movements.

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 7038 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News — Neanderthals possessed strong, yet high-pitched, voices that the stocky hominins used for both singing and speaking, according to recent British news reports. The theory suggests that Neanderthals, who once lived in Europe from around 200,000 to 35,000 B.C., were intelligent and socially complex. It also indicates that although Neanderthals likely represented a unique species, they had more in common with modern humans than previously thought. Stephen Mithen, a professor of archaeology at Reading University, made the determination after studying the skeletal remains of Neanderthals. His work coincides with last week's release of the first complete, articulated Neanderthal skeleton. Information about the new skeleton is published in the current issue of the journal The Anatomical Record Part B: The New Anatomist. Mithen compared related skeletal Neanderthal data with that of monkeys and other members of the ape family, including modern humans. In a recent University College London seminar, Mithen explained that Neanderthal anatomy suggests the early hominins had the physical ability to communicate with pitch and melody. He believes they probably utilized these abilities in a form of communication that was half spoken and half sung. Copyright © 2005 Discovery Communications Inc.

Keyword: Evolution
Link ID: 7037 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Binge drinking could result in plummeting moods and impair cognitive performance, a new UK study of young alcohol drinkers suggests. And the research indicates that women are more affected than men. Getting drunk by downing large amounts of booze quickly, followed by days of abstinence can be considered as undergoing repeated alcohol withdrawal, say Theodora Duka at the University of Sussex, and Julia Townshend, now at Thames Valley University, both in the UK. This kind of withdrawal is known to affect cognitive ability and emotional responses in alcoholic patients, so the pair set out examine the effects of binge-drinking on these responses. "There is evidence that repeated, abrupt increases of alcohol levels in the brain, followed by abstinence, induces more damage in the brain than the same amount of alcohol taken uninterrupted in the same length of time," says Duka. The study found that young people whose questionnaires revealed them to be binge-drinkers were generally less upbeat than regular drinkers and did less well on short-term memory tests. "It also seemed to be the women binge drinkers that were worse affected," says Townshend. "The binge drinking population used to be mostly men and boys - but now they are very much being caught up by women. If it's the case that their cognitive function is more impaired then this is something to worry about." © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 7036 - Posted: 06.24.2010

It may be possible to develop a simple blood test to diagnose multiple sclerosis, scientists believe. MS is currently diagnosed through a combination of scans, tests and physical examination, and can be difficult to spot. But researchers found people with relapsing-remitting MS have a distinct pattern of proteins in their blood. The Wake Forest University study features in the Journal of Molecular Neuroscience. MS is a progressive disease of the central nervous system that affects the brain and spinal cord. Common signs can include fatigue, psychological changes, weakness or paralysis of limbs, numbness, vision problems, difficulties speaking or walking, bladder problems, and sexual dysfunction. Eventually, patients may become totally paralysed and wheelchair-bound. The Wake Forest team compared blood samples from 25 patients newly diagnosed with relapsing-remitting MS with samples from 25 healthy people. Relapsing-remitting MS is the most common form of the disease, and is characterised by attacks interspersed with stable periods. The researchers found that the MS patients had a different pattern of proteins - and their building blocks, peptides - in their blood. Lead researcher Dr Jagannadha Avasarala said: "We found a distinct pattern in the MS group that revealed the existence of three markers for the disease. (C)BBC

Keyword: Multiple Sclerosis
Link ID: 7035 - Posted: 03.15.2005

By MARY DUENWALD Tysabri had been on the market such a short time that Jane Dentis was able to have only one intravenous treatment. But the drug seemed to diminish her symptoms of multiple sclerosis almost immediately. The persistent sensation of tremors - "like my whole body was shaking on the inside" - disappeared by the time she made the one-hour drive from Omaha to her home in Lincoln, Neb. Ms. Dentis, who is 40 and learned that she had M.S. four years ago, found Tysabri "absolutely miraculous," especially compared with the two other drugs she had tried. Two weeks ago, Tysabri was pulled off the market, and Ms. Dentis's doctors canceled her second monthly treatment. The companies that market Tysabri, Biogen Idec and Elan, halted sales and tests of the drug after two patients who had been taking it developed a rare but deadly neurological illness. The two, a man and a woman in their 40's, had been taking Tysabri, along with Avonex, an older multiple sclerosis treatment, for more than two years as part of a clinical trial. Both developed progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy, or P.M.L., an illness, usually fatal, that impairs nerve function. One has died. Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Multiple Sclerosis
Link ID: 7034 - Posted: 03.15.2005

Animal trainer Mike Rueb always appreciates when people come into the Bide-A-Wee animal shelter to adopt a dog. But he knows the choice they make could go astray. “We want to make sure that it’s going to be compatible for the dog and for the owner. Otherwise it will be quite difficult for everybody involved.” Difficult because different dogs have different needs and often times people will choose a dog based simply on what they look like. University of Texas at Austin psychologist Sam Gosling thinks that's like marrying someone based on looks alone. He presented evidence at the annual conference of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington, D.C., suggesting that dogs have distinct characteristics that make up personalities just like people, including energy, anxiety, intelligence and affection. “From our reviews of animal personality, we have seen that there are animal versions of these human traits,” says Gosling, who took a standard personality test for people and applied it to dogs. “This is a direct application of human methods. If I wanted to learn about your personality what I would do is I would ask people to tell me about you.” Gosling asked 78 people to rate their dogs on those traits, and then had strangers who observed the dogs do the same. He found strong agreement between these groups, and large personality differences even among dogs of the same breed. © ScienCentral, 2000-2005.

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 7033 - Posted: 06.24.2010

When it comes to brains, it seems evident that bigger is better. But scientists are still debating just what the evolutionary benefit of having a big brain really is. Now, a study across a range of bird species suggests that a larger brain may confer at least one important advantage: being better able to survive in new, non-native environments. Compared to nearly all other mammals, including our primate cousins, we humans have the greatest brain size relative to our body mass. As for why, one popular hypothesis holds that enlarged brains--not just in humans but in other animals as well--are an adaptation to new or changed environmental conditions. Yet there has been little firm evidence for this idea. So recently an international team of researchers set about testing this hypothesis in birds, a class of animals with widely varying habitats and relative brain sizes. The team, which included biologists Daniel Sol of the Autonomous University of Barcelona and Louis Lefebvre of McGill University in Montreal, analyzed a previously compiled global database that documents the results of 645 attempts by humans to introduce 195 bird species to entirely new locations, such as islands or different continents. The measure of success was whether the birds could establish a new, self-sustaining population. Copyright © 2005 by the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Keyword: Intelligence; Evolution
Link ID: 7032 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Tenn. – Laws and public policy will often miss their mark until they incorporate an understanding of why, biologically, humans behave as they do, scholars from Vanderbilt and Yale universities argue in the March issue of Columbia Law Review. “The legal system tends to assume that either people are purely rational actors or that their brains are blank slates on which culture and only culture is written. The reality is much more complicated and can only be appreciated with a deeper understanding of behavioral biology,” said Vanderbilt law professor and biologist Owen Jones. He co-authored the article with Timothy Goldsmith, Yale professor emeritus of molecular, cellular and developmental biology. All laws at their foundation are designed to influence human behavior, from how we interact with one another, to how we relate to our own property and that of others, to how government agencies interact with each other and with citizens, Jones said. When developing laws, legislators and legal scholars have traditionally relied heavily on the social sciences, such as economics, psychology and political science, often responding to the popular or political trends of their time. They have rarely looked to incorporate the latest findings from fields such as biology, neuroscience and cognitive psychology, which have grown exponentially in recent years and have shed brand new light on how the human brain is structured and how it influences behavior. Copyright 2004 Vanderbilt University

Keyword: Miscellaneous; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 7031 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Deirdre Lockwood A brain scan developed in mice could herald a safe and affordable way to screen patients for Alzheimer's disease before they show any symptoms. Currently, doctors can diagnose the disease only after patients develop traits such as forgetfulness and confusion. But 10 to 20 years before these symptoms appear, toxic clumps of protein called amyloid plaques form in the brain. Researchers have characterized these tiny plaques in brain tissue after death, but they have struggled to capture images of them in living patients. Now Takaomi Saido and colleagues at the RIKEN Brain Science Institute in Wako City, Japan, have developed a way to view these plaques in the brains of live mice using MRI, a magnetic imaging technique widely available in hospitals. Previous MRI studies used signals from hydrogen, which occurs naturally in the body. But this made it hard to see the pinpoint-sized plaques against the background noise of other structures in the brain. ©2005 Nature Publishing Group

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 7030 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Rob Stein, Washington Post Staff Writer According to the Bible, "a merry heart doeth good like a medicine." Now, modern science may be validating that Old Testament proverb -- a good laugh may actually help fend off heart attacks and strokes. "We believe laughing is good for your health," said Michael Miller of the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore, who led the research. "And we think we have evidence to show why that's the case." A growing body of other evidence has suggested that negative emotions, particularly depression and stress, can be harmful, making people more prone to illness, more likely to experience suffering from their ailments and less likely to recover as quickly, or at all. One recent study even found sudden emotional shock can trigger life-threatening heart symptoms that many doctors mistake for a classic heart attack. Miller himself, along with his colleagues, had done a study that found people who have a negative reaction to social situations tend to be more prone to heart disease. But far less has been done to examine whether positive emotions can reduce the risk and complications of illness. © 2005 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Neuroimmunology; Emotions
Link ID: 7029 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Jennifer Couzin, Special to The Washington Post At 13, I teamed up with my best friend Jill on Halloween: She was a nurse, and I dressed as an injured person. Though we wrapped my body in white gauze and Ace bandages, some of my outfit was not part of the costume. I was in my second month on crutches then, for a painful knee problem that had lingered since August, a case of bone outpacing muscle as it grew. By spring doctors could explain why my knees had taken so long to improve: My legs didn't harbor the only bones growing astray. In May 1990, the month of my 14th birthday, I was diagnosed with scoliosis, a curvature of the spine. The development, my doctor believed, had further unbalanced my knees. Most cases of scoliosis are mild but a minority are not, and I stumbled headfirst into that category. Within months the condition worsened. Pain radiated through my back, my ribs, my hips, my chest. Its demands for attention intruded at the most inopportune times: during French class, a Halloween party, gossip about boys. What I didn't know then was that kids like me were everywhere. "Most people don't think of kids as having chronic pain, but there are tragically thousands and thousands of kids who are eligible," said Laura Tosi, an orthopedic surgeon at Children's Hospital in the District. © Copyright 1996-2005 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Pain & Touch
Link ID: 7028 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Plans to withdraw four key drugs used to treat Alzheimer's disease from the NHS have been met with opposition from government ministers. Aricept, Exelon, Reminyl and Ebixa are the only drugs licensed in Britain for the treatment of the disease. The National Institute for Clinical Excellence, in its draft guidance, said the drugs were not cost-effective. But health minister Stephen Ladyman told the Observer Nice needs to look at the wider impact of its decision. The drugs, which campaigners estimate cost £2.50 per day per patient, improve memory and can make daily living tasks easier. The plans have sparked outrage from campaigners, who say they will adversely affect thousands of people with dementia and could discourage further research into the area. Nice has already stated that patients already taking the drugs would not have them withdrawn. It added that it was only draft guidance at present and patients would not be affected until the final decision in July when the consultation had been finished. A Department of Health spokesperson said: "The government respects the independence of Nice. "However, in view of the public concern over the draft proposals, the government will want to ensure that all aspects have been fully considered." He said the Department of Health will be asking Nice if it has taken into account "the wider social implications of not approving the drugs' use, especially the benefits and costs to carers as well as patients". Mr Ladyman said his department will submit a report in the coming week emphasising the benefits of the drugs. (C)BBC

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 7027 - Posted: 03.14.2005

By SARAH KERSHAW SALEM, Ore. - Next to the old mortuary, where the dead were once washed and prepared for burial or cremation, is a locked room without a name. Inside the room, in a dim and dusty corner of one of many abandoned buildings on the decaying campus of the Oregon State Hospital here, are 3,489 copper urns, the shiny metal dull and smeared with corrosion, the canisters turning green. The urns hold the ashes of mental patients who died here from the late 1880's to the mid-1970's. The remains were unclaimed by families who had long abandoned their sick relatives, when they were alive and after they were dead. The urns have engraved serial numbers pressed into the tops of the cans. The lowest number on the urns still stored in the room is 01, the highest 5,118. Over the decades, about 1,600 families have reclaimed urns containing their relatives' ashes, but those left are lined up meticulously on wood shelves. Short strips of masking tape with storage information are affixed to each shelf: "Vault #2, Shelf #36, plus four unmarked urns," one piece of tattered tape says. Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Schizophrenia; Depression
Link ID: 7026 - Posted: 03.14.2005

Scientists at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland have used RNA interference in transgenic mice to silence a mutated gene that causes inherited cases of amytrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), substantially delaying both the onset and the progression rate of the fatal motor neuron disease. Their results will be published in the April issue of Nature Medicine, and in the journal's advanced online publication March 13. In addition to silencing the mutated gene that causes ALS, the EPFL researchers were able to simultaneously deliver a normal version of the gene to motor neuron cells using a single delivery mechanism. "This is the first proof of principle in the human form of a disease of the nervous system in which you can silence the gene and at the same time produce another normal form of the protein," notes Patrick Aebischer, EPFL President and a co-author of the study. ALS is a progressive neurological disease that attacks the motor neurons controlling muscles. Although its victims retain all their mental faculties, they experience gradual paralysis and eventually lose all motor function, becoming unable to speak, swallow or breathe. Known also as Lou Gehrig's disease, from the baseball player who succumbed to it, this harrowing disease has no cure and its pathogenesis is not very well understood.

Keyword: ALS-Lou Gehrig's Disease
Link ID: 7025 - Posted: 03.14.2005

WASHINGTON — College seems to pay off well into retirement. A new study from the University of Toronto sheds light on why higher education seems to buffer people from cognitive declines as they age. Brain imaging showed that in older adults taking memory tests, more years of education were associated with more active frontal lobes – the opposite of what happened in young adults. It appears possible that education strengthens the ability to “call in the reserves” of mental prowess found in that part of the brain. A full report appears in the March issue of Neuropsychology, which is published by the American Psychological Association (APA). A team of psychologists led by Mellanie Springer, MSc, chose a memory task because even normal aging brings some memory loss. They were intrigued by how highly educated patients with Alzheimer’s disease appear to be better able than less educated patients to compensate for brain pathology, which suggested that education somehow protects cognition. To understand the mechanism, the researchers studied the relationship between education and brain activity in two different age groups: 14 adults of ages 18 to 30, with 11 to 20 years of education, and 19 adults of age 65 and up, with eight to 21 years of education. Springer and her colleagues ran each participant through several memory tests while scanning his or her brain with functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). © 2005 American Psychological Association

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 7024 - Posted: 06.24.2010