Nearly half of extremely premature babies who survive develop a disability or learning difficulty, a study says. Another third had mild impairments, such as the need to wear glasses, by the time they reached six years old - double the average rate. The Epicure study has been monitoring the development of babies born in the UK and Ireland before 26 weeks in 1995. Researchers said the findings would help parents understand what problems their children were likely to face. More than 1,200 babies born under 26 weeks were originally involved in the study but only 314 ever left hospital and 241 were assessed in the latest round of tests. The report, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, revealed 22% had a severe disability such as cerebral palsy, blindness or profound deafness, and a further 24% had moderate disability, such as special learning needs. The rate of moderate or severe disability among the general population is about 1%. The figures also revealed that more than a third of extremely premature boys had moderate to severe disabilities - 2.4 times than the number of girls. Researchers were not able to explain what caused the disabilities, although it is thought possible adverse conditions in the womb may be the cause. But they said they hoped research in the future would look at why some have disabilities while others do not. Lead author Neil Marlow, professor of neonatal medicine at the University of Nottingham, said the findings would help doctors and parents understand and prepare for what sort of life a premature baby would have (C)BBC

Keyword: Development of the Brain
Link ID: 6665 - Posted: 01.06.2005

By Clayton Collins Ever quickly sized up a situation and just known what action to take - or had a startlingly clear first impression of a stranger that later turned out to be preternaturally astute? You may have jacked into what Malcolm Gladwell calls "the giant supercomputer in [your] unconscious." To get to know that mental motherboard, you might consider enlisting Gladwell as your IT support man. In "Blink," Gladwell cleanly decodes the science of rapid cognition, those snap judgments made with only the subtlest clues. Some of his examples: • A curator sees a Greek statue as fake despite persuasive evidence to the contrary. • A tennis coach watches a player toss up a ball and knows that on contact it will streak into the net. • A behavioral expert watches couples interact briefly and predicts correctly which will divorce eventually. Such decisions may seem arbitrary, even arrogant. When they present themselves, most of us reject them as hunches. To make them any more than a starting point in a complex decisionmaking process seems rash. Copyright © 2005 The Christian Science Monitor

Keyword: Attention
Link ID: 6664 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Traditionally viewed as supporting actors, cells known as glia may be essential for the normal development of nerve cells responsible for hearing and balance, according to new University of Utah research. The study is reported in the January 6, 2005 issue of Neuron and is co-authored by scientists at the University of Washington. "Using zebrafish as a model, we've demonstrated that glial cells play a previously unidentified role in regulating the development of sensory hair cell precursors -- the specialized neurons found in the inner ear of humans that make hearing possible. This research increases our understanding of how nerve cells develop and whether it may be possible to regenerate these types of cells in humans one day," said Tatjana Piotrowski, Ph.D., assistant professor of neurobiology and anatomy at the University of Utah School of Medicine. Scientists long have known that glial cells, or simply glia, are essential for healthy nerve cells. However, in the last 10 years scientists have learned that glia aren't just "glue" holding nerve cells together. Glia communicate with each other and even influence synapse formation between neurons. Piotrowski's research in zebrafish focuses on the development of sensory neurons known as hair cells. Like humans, zebrafish use hair cells to detect sound and motion. However, in humans hair cells are buried deep inside the inner ear making them difficult to access. Hair cells in zebrafish are located on the surface of their body and help the fish swim in groups and avoid predators.

Keyword: Glia; Hearing
Link ID: 6663 - Posted: 01.06.2005

As first-time parents, Suzanne Hill and Ralph Scibelli knew that babies often wake up during the night, but after the a year or so their son Ethan was only sleeping a few hours at a time, waking up throughout each night. "Ethan did not like to sleep," Scibelli recalls. They tried feeding him more, walking him around their Manhattan neighborhood, playing soothing music and even resorted to letting him cry in hope that he would tire himself out. Nothing worked. "We tried everything," says Hill. "Three and a half, four hours would be the maximum that he would sleep. We just said, 'Ok, well, if this is the way he is…'" Fortunately, Ethan outgrew his restless nights. But what if he hadn't? Addiction psychologist Robert Zucker, director of the University of Michigan Addiction Research Center, and his research team have found that sleep problems in boys aged three to five may be a warning sign for possible increased risk of cigarette, alcohol and other drug use in their early teens. "Children who have these [sleep] problems are…somewhat more than twice as likely to have this risk marker of early use of alcohol and early cigarette smoking and early other drug use," Zucker explains. © ScienCentral, 2000- 2005.

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Sleep
Link ID: 6662 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Recognizing faces is an innate ability in primates; even the youngest infants respond to Mom's face. So, a fascinating and central question in neurobiology is where in the hierarchy of visual processing face recognition takes place. Through a series of precise experimental manipulations of perception in human subjects, Farshad Moradi and his colleagues have gained new insight into the process. They have found that identifying a face depends on actually seeing it, as opposed to merely having the image of the face fall on the retina. In one set of experiments, the researchers took advantage of a phenomenon called "binocular rivalry" to present face images to subjects in circumstances under which the retinal input would remain perceptually invisible. In such binocular rivalry experiments, a different image is presented simultaneously to each eye. Since the visual system can only pay attention to one image at a time, the other remains "invisible"--suppressed from visual awareness. The researchers found that in such experiments the recognition of the face depended on actually perceiving it. In contrast, they found, such lower-level "aftereffects" as recognizing the orientation of the face were not affected by lack of visual awareness.

Keyword: Vision
Link ID: 6661 - Posted: 01.06.2005

From pouring a glass of milk to typing a news article, precise timing--down to the thousandth of a second--is key to the brain's control of movement. By studying how monkeys track a visual target, Javier Medina and his colleagues have gained new insights into the strategies that the brain uses to measure time. Their findings indicate that the brain measures time by assessing the duration of a process--using the internal equivalent of a neural stopwatch--as well as by computing the distance that an object being tracked has moved. However, they found that the monkeys did not use the target position as a cue about when to expect its shift to vertical motion. In their experiments, the researchers trained monkeys to track a target moving horizontally across a screen. After a fixed time interval, the target would abruptly move vertically. To probe how the monkeys were judging time, the researchers would infrequently insert an instance in which the target moved only horizontally. In such cases, because of their previous experience, the monkeys would briefly shift their gaze upward at the appropriate time to pursue the expected vertical target movement. To learn how the monkeys' brains were processing the movement information, the researchers conducted a series of experiments. The scientists measured the animals' vertical-motion eye responses when they systematically varied (1) the time interval of the horizontal motion before vertical movement, (2) the position of the target when it went vertical, and (3) the speed of horizontal target movement.

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 6660 - Posted: 01.06.2005

The human brain's remarkable flexibility to understand a variety of signals as language extends to an unusual whistle language used by shepherds on one of the Canary Islands off the northwest coast of Africa. And the way the brain processes these whistles is similar to the way it goes about deciphering English, Spanish or other spoken languages, according to research being published in tomorrow's issue of the journal Nature. "Science has developed the idea of brain areas that are dedicated to language and we are starting to understand the scope of signals that can be recognized as language," said David Corina, a University of Washington associate professor of psychology and co-author of the study. "But how far can you stretch this idea? Sign language studies have shown we can stretch the envelope and here we are expanding it in another way to a whistle language. The brain is adaptable, or plastic, in understanding a variety of forms of communication." The language studied by Corina and his colleague, Manuel Carreiras, a psychology professor at the University of La Laguna, on the island of Tenerife in the Canaries, is Silbo Gomero, or Silbo. It is primarily used by shepherds to communicate with each other over long distances of rugged terrain on the island of La Gomera, another island in the Spanish owned Canaries.

Keyword: Language
Link ID: 6659 - Posted: 01.06.2005

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Whether emotional responses to scent are a product of nature or nurture is a matter of scientific debate. But a Brown University study, published in the current issue of the International Journal of Comparative Psychology, comes down on the nurturing side. In an experiment that involved computer games and custom-made scents, researchers found that responses to new odors depended on emotions experienced while the new odor was present. If participants had a good time playing the game, they were more likely to report liking the odor they smelled. If they had an unpleasant experience, they were more likely to dislike the scent. “As humans, we’re not immediately predisposed to respond to a scent and believe that it is good or bad,” said Rachel Herz, a visiting assistant professor of psychology at Brown and the lead scientist of the study. “When we like or don’t like a smell, that is learned.” Herz conducted two experiments to test her theory of olfaction. The first included 30 female participants. All were asked to smell five scents, infused in cotton in glass jars, and rate them on a 9-point scale for pleasantness, familiarity and intensity. Most odors were familiar and pleasant – rose, vanilla, lemon and peppermint. But one was new: a unique mix of odors that included dirt, rain and hot buttered popcorn. The result was a sweet, dank, slightly unpleasant scent.

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste); Emotions
Link ID: 6658 - Posted: 06.24.2010

The development of schizophrenia can be accurately predicted in high risk groups years before symptoms harden into psychosis, say scientists. A team from Edinburgh University has found people who go on to develop schizophrenia show subtle signs at an early stage. This includes social withdrawal, odd behaviour, and feelings of being disconnected from reality. Details are published in the British Journal of Psychiatry. The Edinburgh High-Risk Study, which began in 1994, aims to pin down why some people at high risk of developing schizophrenia go on to develop the condition, while others, apparently equally vulnerable, do not. The latest study focused on 163 young adults, aged 16-24, with two relatives with schizophrenia. The researchers found those who went on to develop schizophrenia tended to be more anxious, more withdrawn and experience more "schizotypal" thoughts than those who remained well. These symptoms often caused very little distress, and had minimal impact on quality of life. They may be short-lived, and followed by years in which they do not occur at all. But the researchers say they can be picked up fairly easily by using simple behavioural tests. The study also found that people who went on to develop schizophrenia tended to show lapses in their memory of events. The researchers believe their work provides strong evidence that schizophrenia is linked to problems with an area of the brain called the temporal lobe, which develop slowly over several years. At this stage, the exact nature of the change that pushes an individual into psychosis is not yet clear. (C)BBC

Keyword: Schizophrenia
Link ID: 6657 - Posted: 01.05.2005

Women may be more at risk of eating disorders than men because of the way their brain processes information. Scientists found the female brain responds differently to a man's when exposed to certain words concerned with body image. The findings may provide an explanation for why ten times as many women develop anorexia and bulimia than men. The study, by Japan's Hiroshima University, is published in the British Journal of Psychiatry. British experts welcomed the research and said it could lead to a better understanding of how eating disorders develop. A spokesman for the Eating Disorders Assocation said: "We know there are differences between how men and women reason and think. "But this study throws new light on the problem." Eating disorders are a serious problem in the UK. It is estimated that at least 165,000 people, 90 per cent of them women, are affected and that one in ten will die as a result of their condition. Both anorexia, which involves starving the body of food and bulimia, a cycle of starving and bingeing, are closely linked to mental illness. They now account for more deaths among psychiatric patients than anything else. But until now, there has been no obvious trigger for why women get the disorder. Although genetic make-up does have some influence, problems with eating can also be brought on stress at school, depression and even bereavement among family or friends. The latest study hints at an underlying physiological cause. Scientists took 13 men and 13 women and exposed them to a series of tests in which they were asked to read two sets of words. (C)BBC

Keyword: Anorexia & Bulimia
Link ID: 6656 - Posted: 01.05.2005

Monkey stem cells can repair the brain damage caused by Parkinson's disease, Japanese researchers have shown. The findings, published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, offer renewed hope of a similar treatment for humans. Until now, research showing stem cell therapy can work in Parkinson's has mainly been carried out on rodents. The Kyoto University team said more research was now needed to prove the treatment was safe and effective. Stem cells are premature cells that are capable of becoming any of a number of mature cells within the body, given the right conditions. Dr Jun Takahashi and colleagues took some stem cells from monkeys and encouraged them to grow into the brain cells, or neurons, that are damaged in Parkinson's disease. These are neurons that produce the chemical messenger dopamine. To encourage their development the researchers exposed the stem cells to a growth factor that is produced exclusively in the area of the brain affected by Parkinson's disease and is thought to have a protective effect on dopamine-producing neurons. These results suggest that transplantation using embryonic stem cells as a clinical therapy for Parkinson's disease is approaching the point of technical feasibility. They then transplanted the stem cell-derived dopamine-producing neurons into monkeys with a condition analogous to human Parkinson's disease. The transplanted cells worked as hoped, and reduced the symptoms of Parkinson's in the monkeys. The researchers said: "These results suggest that transplantation using embryonic stem cells as a clinical therapy for Parkinson's disease is approaching the point of technical feasibility." (C)BBC

Keyword: Parkinsons; Stem Cells
Link ID: 6655 - Posted: 01.05.2005

By George Dvorsky It was hard to believe that that the words were coming from a seven-year-old boy. "Another characteristic of mammals is that they give placental births," he said, "Oh, except marsupials like kangaroos and koala bears." Changing gears slightly he continued, "And then there are animals with endoskeletons and exoskeletons. Humans, because they have bones on the inside of their bodies have endoskeletons, but insects have exoskeletons on the outside." With a vocabulary more closely resembling that of someone in grade nine, he chimed off the bits of scientific triviata as if he were directly linked to Wikipedia. Clearly, this was no ordinary second grader, whom I chatted with recently at a Toronto specialist's office. Compared to other kids with Asperger's syndrome, however, his abilities are considered quite typical. His younger brother, who also has Asperger's, is already doing multiplication tables in his head while most of his kindergarten classmates are still trying to count to 10. The boy also has social interaction and behavioral problems typical of those with Asperger's. He tends to construe all advances from his classmates as bothersome, for example, compulsively chews on his sleeves and frequently stands up to spin in class. This is pretty textbook stuff for "Aspies"—an affectionate moniker that's increasingly coming to be used to refer to those with Asperger's syndrome, a high-functioning form of autism. Copyright © 2002-2004 Betterhumans

Keyword: Autism
Link ID: 6654 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Becky Ham, Science Writer Depression can double the risk of death or repeat heart disease in heart attack patients, according to two reviews of more than 40 studies that examine the link between depression and heart disease. The reviews are published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine. In the first analysis of 22 studies, patients who were depressed after their heart attacks had a twofold increase in the risk of dying or suffering a new heart problem two years after their heart attack, according to Joost van Melle, M.D., and colleagues of University Hospital Groningen in the Netherlands. In the second analysis of 20 studies by Jürgen Barth, Ph.D., of University of Freiburg in Germany and colleagues, the researchers concluded that depressed patients were twice as likely to die within two years after their first heart disease episode compared with non-depressed patients. According to van Melle, post-heart attack depression is common, affecting nearly 20 percent of all heart attack patients. The two research teams found that the relationship between depression and a higher risk of death and disease stayed consistent despite a variety of ways to measure depression.

Keyword: Depression
Link ID: 6653 - Posted: 01.05.2005

Who needs drugs when nursing can be such a great high? New research shows that brain scans of suckling moms are indistinguishable from those of virgin rats on cocaine, supporting the idea that nature rewards mothers for nurturing their pups. The work, described in 5 January issue of the Journal of Neuroscience, also sets the stage to better understand the mother-child bond in humans. When given the choice, rats with babies under 8 days of age will choose suckling their pups over cocaine. Researchers believe this strong motivation to nurse has evolved to help mothers bond with their offspring. Previous work involving damaging parts of the brain or blocking neurotransmitters has shown that the reward system of the brain is involved both in suckling and in drug stimulation. But no one had imaged the brain of a conscious rat for these studies. To address this, Craig Ferris of the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester and colleagues monitored the effect of suckling and cocaine use in wide-awake mother rats using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the entire brain. When the team compared the MRIs of suckling mother rats to virgin rats given cocaine, it found that the same areas of the brain lit up in both groups. If the mother rats received injections of cocaine, the reward system in their brains dipped in activity below the lactation high, suggesting that lactation somehow interferes with the rewarding effects of cocaine. This work will allow scientists to bridge what we know about rats to humans, says neuroscientist Joan Morrell at Rutgers University in Newark, New Jersey. "And it's a good overview of the systems that get turned on during suckling and drug use." --MARY BECKMAN Copyright © 2005 by the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 6652 - Posted: 06.24.2010

The replenishment of missing neurons in the brain as a treatment for Parkinson disease reached the stage of human trials over 15 years ago, however the field is still in its infancy. Researchers from Kyoto University have now shown that dopamine-producing neurons (DA neurons) generated from monkey embryonic stem cells and transplanted into areas of the brain where these neurons have degenerated in a monkey model of Parkinson disease, can reverse parkinsonism. Their results appear in the January 3 issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation. Studies of animal models of Parkinson disease as well as clinical investigations, have shown that transplantation of fetal DA neurons can relieve the symptoms this disease. However the technical and ethical difficulties in obtaining sufficient and appropriate donor fetal brain tissue have limited the application of this therapy. These researchers previously demonstrated that mouse embryonic stem cells can differentiate into neurons when cultured under specific conditions. These same culture conditions, technically simple and efficient, were recently applied to primate embryonic stem cells and resulted in the generation of large numbers of DA neurons. In their current JCI study, Jun Takahashi and colleagues generated neurons from monkey embryonic stem cells and exposed these cells to FGF20, a growth factor that is produced exclusively in the area of the brain affected by Parkinson disease and is reported to have a protective effect on DA neurons. The authors observed increased DA neuron development and subsequently transplanted these neurons into monkeys treated with an agent called MPTP, which is considered a primate model for Parkinson disease.

Keyword: Parkinsons; Stem Cells
Link ID: 6651 - Posted: 01.04.2005

By GINA KOLATA With obesity much on Americans' minds, an entire industry has sprung up selling diets and diet books, meal replacements and exercise programs, nutritional supplements and Internet-based coaching, all in an effort to help people lose weight. But a new study, published today, finds little evidence that commercial weight-loss programs are effective in helping people drop excess pounds. Almost no rigorous studies of the programs have been carried out, the researchers report. And federal officials say that companies are often unwilling to conduct such studies, arguing that they are in the business of treatment, not research. "In general, the industry has always been opposed to making outcomes disclosures," said Richard Cleland, the assistant director for advertising practices at the Federal Trade Commission. "They have always given various rationales," Mr. Cleland said, from "'It's too expensive,' to even arguing that part of this is selling the dream, and if you know what the truth is, it's harder to sell the dream." The study, published in today's issue of Annals of Internal Medicine, found that with the exception of Weight Watchers, no commercial program had published reliable data from randomized trials showing that people who participated weighed less a few months later than people who did not participate. And even in the Weight Watchers study, the researchers said, the results were modest, with a 5 percent weight loss after three to six months of dieting, much of it regained. Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Obesity
Link ID: 6650 - Posted: 01.04.2005

When people drink too much or too often, their brains adapt to the effects of ethanol. And that's what makes stopping so hard for some people. "[In] chronic long-term alcoholism, the brain can adapt to overcome the…repressive nature of ethanol and keep the brain functioning at a useful level," says Sid Strickland, Dean of the Graduate School at Rockefeller University. "So, that's what the brain is trying to do—it's an adaptive response to the depressive quality of ethanol." The adaptation happens when the brain's cells make more molecules called receptors. Receptors receive the chemical messages nerve cells send to each other. The chemical messages are the way that nerve cells communicate. Strickland reported in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that during alcohol consumption, a gene called tissue plasminogen activator (tPA)—best known as a clot-buster for fighting the effects of stroke and heart-attacks—helps the brain create an enzyme that makes the extra receptors. This finding could eventually make the alcohol withdrawal process easier for those who want to stop drinking. "The idea would be…if a person had chronically abused ethanol, and was wanting to stop that abuse, you could possibly inhibit this [gene] and that would lessen the effects of the abrupt withdrawal," says Strickland. © ScienCentral, 2000- 2005.

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 6649 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By ROB GILLIES, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS TORONTO -- U.S. agriculture officials reaffirmed their support for lifting the ban on Canadian beef despite the discovery of a second case of mad cow disease in Canada, expressing confidence that public health measures will protect American livestock and consumers. Canada's Food Inspection Agency said yesterday that an older dairy cow from the province of Alberta has tested positive for bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or mad cow disease. The results confirmed preliminary tests released last week. Canada suspects the cow became infected through contaminated animal feed. The cow was born in 1996, before a 1997 ban on certain types of feed, the agency said. It did not enter the human food or animal feed supply and posed no risk to the public, the agency said. The disease attacks an animal's nervous system. Food contaminated with the prions that cause it can afflict people with usually fatal variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. ©1996-2004 Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Keyword: Prions
Link ID: 6648 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Experts say they have discovered a way that drinking alcohol impairs driving ability. As well as blighting decision-making powers and balance, it disrupts one's ability to judge depth, the North Dakota State University team found. Drivers who are under the influence of alcohol may not be able to gauge distances, leading to accidents, according to the researchers. Their findings appear in the journal Psychological Science. Dr Mark Nawrot and colleagues looked at a particular type of depth perception, called motion parallax. This is information about the relative depth of objects gleaned from our own motion. For example, under normal conditions, a driver should be able to judge how far away a tree or another vehicle is from their own moving car. It is well known that binocular vision is important for depth perception. To see objects clearly we move our eyes so that the fovea, the area with the best visual acuity, is positioned upon the area of interest. These movements are produced by two different systems - the fast and slow eye movement systems. Fast eye movements allow us to dart our eyes to where we want. Slow eye movements allow us to fixate and track moving objects. Alcohol impairs both eye systems. (C)BBC

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Vision
Link ID: 6647 - Posted: 01.04.2005

CHICAGO – Children who appear to have higher levels of shyness, or a particular gene, appear to have a different pattern of processing the signals of interpersonal hostility, according to a study in the January issue of The Archives of General Psychiatry, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. According to background information in the article, "Neuroimaging studies are beginning to clarify the relationship between the brain's cortical and subcortical activity in regulating the emotional and cognitive functions of behavior." … "A temperamental disposition toward the avoidance of novel and uncertain situations together with a set of behaviors that indicate shyness and discomfort in social interactions are comprehensively named childhood shyness, or behavioral inhibition (BI). Children with high indexes of shyness-BI are at a heightened risk of developing anxiety disorders, in particular social phobia." Marco Battaglia, M.D., from the Istituto Scientifico San Raffaele, Milan, Italy, and colleagues analyzed the responses of 49 third- and fourth-grade schoolchildren (characterized as shy) to different emotional facial expressions. The researchers showed the study participants pictures of boys and girls with facial expressions that depicted joy, neutrality, and anger. The study participants were assessed through questionnaires and responses were also recorded with electrodes measuring brain wave activity.

Keyword: Emotions
Link ID: 6646 - Posted: 06.24.2010