Exclusive from New Scientist Print Edition. A specific gene linked to athletic performance has been discovered by Australian sports scientists. The announcement comes as elite athletes vie for glory at the World Athletics Championships in Paris, and reopens the debate about whether top athletes can be screened and nurtured from birth. The gene comes in two variants. People with one variant are predisposed to become sprinters. Those with the second are more likely to excel in endurance events. This is the second gene to be shown to confer athletic ability. The first, angiotensin-converting enzyme, or ACE, makes an enzyme which influences how efficiently our muscles burn oxygen, and the rate at which some muscles grow (New Scientist print edition, 23 May 1998). The gene discovered by the Australian team is called alpha-actinin-3 , or ACTN3. One version, the R allele, makes actinin, a protein found only in fast muscle fibres. These fibres help to produce the explosive bursts of speed and power that sprinters need. The other allele, called X, does not produce actinin-3. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Genes & Behavior; Muscles
Link ID: 4175 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Fetal tissue trial raises stem cell questions. ERIKA CHECK An experimental technique that uses transplanted fetal tissue to treat Parkinson's disease is not yet ready for widespread use, according to a study published online last week. In the study, surgeons transplanted nerve tissue from aborted fetuses into the brains of patients with Parkinson's disease. The disease destroys neurons that produce the chemical dopamine, which is required for normal brain function. The transplanted tissue is intended to replace these damaged cells. But the average condition of the 23 patients who received the treatment did not improve significantly compared with a group of 11 who did not have it. The researchers, led by Warren Olanow of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, measured whether the treatment affected the symptoms of the disease, such as muscle tremors, speech and mental abilities1. © Nature News Service / Macmillan Magazines Ltd 2003

Keyword: Parkinsons; Stem Cells
Link ID: 4174 - Posted: 06.24.2010

She says devices endanger whales and other sea life Jane Kay, Chronicle Environment Writer A federal judge knocked down Tuesday a Navy plan to deploy submarine-hunting sonar in most of the world's oceans, saying the devices endanger entire populations of whales, porpoises and fish. Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Laporte of the U.S. District Court in San Francisco said a permanent injunction should be issued that will bar the Navy from using sonar in areas including 14 million square miles, or about 40 percent, of the Pacific Ocean. But she left open the possibility of limited use of new low-frequency active sonar technology for testing and training in certain areas not considered rich in sea life. Also, Congress is considering legislation that would effectively allow wider use of the sonar technology, despite the judge's ruling. ©2003 San Francisco Chronicle

Keyword: Animal Communication; Hearing
Link ID: 4173 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Dyslexia may be caused by a fault in a single gene, scientists have suggested. Researchers in Finland say their finding may explain why the condition seems to run in families. Dyslexia affects about one in 10 people. It is the most common learning disorder in children. Many find it difficult to recognise and read words. Writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, scientists said a flaw in a gene called DYXC1 may cause the condition. Previous studies have suggested that people with dyslexia process information in a different area of the brain than the average person does, even though they are often of average or above-average intelligence. Other studies have suggested they use the right side of the brain for reading instead of the left side, which is better set up for processing words. (C) BBC

Keyword: Dyslexia
Link ID: 4172 - Posted: 08.27.2003

About one in a hundred people worldwide suffer from schizophrenia. Now neuroscientists may have found a gene variation that predisposes people to this brain disease. As this ScienCentral News video reports, it could lead to genetically targeted drugs for schizophrenia. Presently, schizophrenia affects 2.5 million Americans, and neuroscientists believe that this devastating brain disease is caused by problems with multiple genes. Now they are looking at genetically altered mice to help uncover those problematic genes. Researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) studied genetically altered mice that showed symptoms of schizophrenia. The mice were engineered to lack a protein called calcineurin. © ScienCentral, 2000-2003.

Keyword: Schizophrenia; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 4171 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By SANDEEP JAUHAR, M.D. Not long ago, I went to see a patient in the intensive care unit. A former prisoner of war from World War II, he was in the clutches of a fever that had lasted several weeks, and he had started to deteriorate. "He's getting better," his wife insisted when I spoke with her, gently combing his straight white hair, even after he stopped following simple commands. The intensive care team had done almost everything imaginable to determine the cause of the fever. They had called in consultants from virtually every medical subspecialty. Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 4170 - Posted: 08.27.2003

By ERICA GOODE Ever since Pavlov trained dogs to salivate for meat powder at the sound of a bell, psychologists have used the principles of classical conditioning to study how animals and humans learn. But only recently have they been able to peer into the brain and watch that learning take place. Now a team of English researchers, using a sophisticated brain scanning technique called functional M.R.I., has provided a vivid demonstration of the neural processes at work in a simple Pavlovian conditioning experiment. Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Learning & Memory; Brain imaging
Link ID: 4169 - Posted: 08.27.2003

By ERICA GOODE Zoloft, a commonly prescribed antidepressant, is effective for treating moderate to severe depression in children and adolescents, researchers are reporting today. The research, the largest published study of children to test any of the antidepressants known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or S.S.R.I.'s, found that 69 percent of the subjects who took the drug improved significantly, compared with 59 percent of those who took a dummy pill, a difference that some experts termed modest. The researchers, whose report appears in The Journal of the American Medical Association, concluded that Zoloft "is an effective and well-tolerated short-term treatment" for depressed children and adolescents. Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Depression; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 4168 - Posted: 08.27.2003

Taking amphetamines or cocaine could stop cells in key areas of the brain linking up normally. This, warn experts, could explain why it is feared that long term use of the drugs could affect memory or mood. Rats would be expected to generate new brain "connections" if put in a stimulating environment - but after being given drugs this did not happen. However, experts have warned that results in rat brains may not correspond exactly to human brains. While there are concerns about the long-term effects of amphetamines and cocaine on the brain, it remains a controversial area. While some researchers point to studies which suggest mood problems in some users, others maintain that firm evidence for a link has still not emerged. (C) BBC

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 4167 - Posted: 08.26.2003

By Rob Stein Washington Post Staff Writer When the doctors unwrapped the bandages, Michael May was stunned: He could see shadows and shapes, and, after scanning the fuzzy images around him, make out his wife's blue eyes and blond hair for the first time. May, who had been blinded by a chemical explosion at age 3, had undergone an experimental procedure the day before in the hopes of restoring his vision. But after more than 40 sightless years, he had expected it would take weeks to find out whether he would be able to see the world again. "It was pretty amazing," said May, 49, of Davis, Calif. "We were all in shock. It worked much sooner than anyone had thought. Immediately it was like, 'Look at that. Look at that. Look at that.' " © 2003 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Vision; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 4166 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By SHERRI DAY The food industry, trying to offer healthier versions of popular foods without affecting the taste, is looking for new ways to trick the tongue. If it succeeds, grapefruit juice could be sweet without added sugar, and potato chips flavorful with half the salt. In April the Linguagen Corporation, a biotechnology company in Cranbury, N.J., that is conducting taste research, received a patent for the first molecular compound that will block bitter tastes in foods, beverages and some pharmaceuticals. The compound, named adenosine 5'-monophosphate, or AMP, occurs naturally — it is found in human breast milk, among other places. When added to certain foods, including coffee and canned citrus fruit, Linguagen says, it blocks some of the acidic tastes from being absorbed by the tongue. "The idea of a bitter suppressor is the holy grail," said Linda M. Bartoshuk, a professor at the Yale University School of Medicine and a taste research expert. "Everybody wants to find them." Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste)
Link ID: 4165 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By LAURIE TARKAN It was not until two days before he was to appear on television in Australia to talk about his book that Benjamin Polis, 19, told his girlfriend that he had attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and had, by the way, written an autobiographical account about it. Embarrassed and stigmatized throughout his life, he found it difficult to concede that he was different, even to his closest friends. But the success of his book, "Only a Mother Could Love Him," has changed a lot. Mr. Polis, who as a child cried daily, begging his mother not to send him to school, is now, at 21, speaking out about A.D.H.D., in an effort to help teenagers who have it understand their impulsive, hyperactive and, at times, uncontrollable behavior, as well as to help parents handle their children better. The book has sold several thousand copies in the United States and in Australia, where Mr. Polis lives. Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

Keyword: ADHD
Link ID: 4164 - Posted: 08.26.2003

By RICHARD C. SALTUS You can be truly smart and still struggle in life if you lack the ability to plan, organize time and space, initiate projects and see them through to completion, and you cannot resist immediate temptations in favor of later better rewards. When those capacities are damaged or underdeveloped, even people with intelligence and talent may flounder. They are often misunderstood as being willfully disorganized or lazy, possessing a bad attitude or, from a parental viewpoint, "doing this on purpose to drive me crazy." More and more, however, neuroscientists are saying such puzzling underachievers may suffer from neurological abnormalities affecting "the brain's C.E.O." This control center, really an array of "executive functions," orchestrates resources like memory, language and attention to achieve a goal, be it a fraction of a second or five years from now.

Keyword: ADHD; Attention
Link ID: 4163 - Posted: 08.26.2003

Researchers know that certain kinds of experiences, such as those involved in learning, can physically change brain structure and affect behavior. Now, new research in rats shows that exposure to stimulant drugs such as amphetamine or cocaine can impair the ability of specific brain cells to change as a consequence of experience. “The ability of experiences to alter brain structure is thought to be one of the primary mechanisms by which the past can influence behavior and cognition,” says NIDA Director Dr. Nora D. Volkow. “However, when these alterations in brain structure are produced by drugs of abuse, they may lead to the development of compulsive patterns of drug-seeking behaviors that are the hallmark of addiction.” NIDA-funded researchers Dr. Bryan Kolb and colleagues at the University of Lethbridge in Canada and Dr. Terry Robinson and colleagues at the University of Michigan conducted this study, which will be published during the week of August 25th on the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Web site.

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 4162 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Bethesda, MD – Could your child be preordained to be an overweight couch potato? New Zealand physiologists are proposing that the well-known association between obesity, metabolic syndrome, sedentary behavior, and overeating might have a common biological cause. Obesity is an increasingly prevalent, costly, and important health problem worldwide. In Western societies such as the United States, the incidence of obesity is approximately 32 percent of the adult population, and the prevalence in children has risen by approximately 40 percent in the last 16 years. It is also rising rapidly in developing countries such as India and China as Western diets and lifestyle are adopted. Although the causes of obesity are multifactorial, these recent increases have been too sudden to be explained by genetic factors. Population studies conducted in the last decade suggest that environmental factors active during embryonic and fetal development are of substantial consequence for the risk of developing metabolic and cardiovascular disorders in adulthood. The biological basis underlying this concept of "fetal programming" remains speculative but may involve permanent alterations in gene expression that may in turn modify tissue differentiation and hormonal and metabolic regulation.

Keyword: Obesity
Link ID: 4161 - Posted: 06.24.2010

An elephant never forgets—or does it? Scientists have long believed that animals do not have so-called episodic memory—the kind that allows humans to remember past events. But recent experiments with scrub jays, chimpanzees, and gorillas have led to rethinking of the nature of memory in animals. Animal memory researchers first face the challenge of communicating between species. "You can't exactly ask the animals where they were, and what they were doing, when Bambi's mother was shot," says Nicola Clayton, a professor of comparative cognition at University of Cambridge in England and a leading researcher in the field of animal memory. Over the past six years Clayton has devised a series of ingenious experiments that seem to show that scrub jays can recall past events and use the information to plan for the future. © 2003 National Geographic Society.

Keyword: Learning & Memory; Evolution
Link ID: 4160 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Although most people take it for granted, learning how to see is a very difficult task. An intriguing case study published in the September issue of Nature Neuroscience describes a man's recovery from 40 years of blindness and should help scientists better understand how the human visual system functions. Ione Fine of the University of California at San Diego and her colleagues followed Michael May, a 43-year-old man who had been blind since the age of three and a half, as he recovered from experimental stem-cell surgery. The procedure restored sight to his right eye in March of 2000. Ever since, he has been struggling to adapt to a viewable world, a common problem for people who have regained their sense of vision after years of blindness. May finds it particularly difficult to interpret faces and facial expressions--during testing, he could only correctly identify a face as male or female 70 percent of the time, and expressions as happy, neutral or sad 61 percent of the time. In addition, seeing only the face of his own wife is still not enough for him to identify her, and he relies on clues such as hair length or gait to help him recognize people. © 1996-2003 Scientific American, Inc

Keyword: Vision; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 4159 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By ERICA GOODE Three drugs commonly prescribed for schizophrenia and other psychotic illnesses increased patients' risk of developing diabetes when compared with older antipsychotic medications, researchers said yesterday, presenting the results from a long-awaited study of patients treated at veterans hospitals and clinics across the country. The drugs — Zyprexa, made by Eli Lilly, Risperdal, made by Jannsen Pharmaceutica, and Seroquel, made by AstraZeneca — were associated with higher rates of diabetes than older generation drugs for schizophrenia like Haldol, the study found. But the increased risk was statistically significant only for Zyprexa and Risperdal, the researchers said, possibly because of the smaller number of subjects who took Seroquel. Younger patients, under age 54, who took Zyprexa or Risperdal showed the highest risk of developing diabetes, the study, led by Francesca Cunningham of the Department of Veterans Affairs at the University of Illinois at Chicago, found. Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Schizophrenia
Link ID: 4158 - Posted: 06.24.2010

A new study completed at the University of California, San Diego describes the effects of long-term blindness on the human visual system. "The Effects of Long-Term Deprivation on Visual Perception and Visual Cortex," will appear in the Aug. 25 online issue of Nature Neuroscience and in the September printed edition of the journal. The collaborative study was led by Ione Fine and Donald MacLeod in the UCSD Psychology Department, and combined psychophysical and neuroimaging techniques to measure the effects of long-term blindness on the visual cortex of the brain. Other researchers involved in the study include Alex Wade, Alyssa Brewer and Brian Wandell, Stanford University and Geoffrey Boynton, Salk Institute. The two-year study focused on the experiences of Michael May, who, after having been completely blind since the age of 3 1/2, successfully underwent an experimental limbal stem cell transplant in his right eye at the age of 43 . After regaining his sight in March of 2000, May, like many others who have regained their sight after decades of blindness, could see the world, but could not interpret what he was seeing. Two years after surgery, he still lives in a world of abstract shapes and colors instead of the environment of recognizable objects with three-dimensional shapes that normally sighted people take for granted.

Keyword: Vision; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 4157 - Posted: 08.25.2003

Scientists believe they may have found out why we all smell and taste things very differently. Our ability to smell and taste is regulated by around 1,000 genes, over half of which are totally inactive. However, a study by researchers in Israel has identified at least 50 of these genes, which are switched on in some people and not in others. They believe this may explain why some of us adore some smells and tastes while others abhor them. Researchers at the Weizmann Institute say their study shows that nearly every human being displays a different pattern of active and inactive odour-detecting receptors. These receptors determine how our brain reads flavours in food as well as smells. (C) BBC

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste)
Link ID: 4156 - Posted: 08.24.2003