Mississippi's illegal roach killer excites attention. HELEN PEARSON The brain centre targeted by traces of a widely used pesticide has been identified by US researchers. The finding could help explain symptoms seen in people exposed to the pesticide in their homes. Several years ago, some US homes were sprayed illegally with the crop pesticide methyl parathion, known to be toxic at high doses. Evidence has since emerged linking the exposure to anxiety, sleeplessness and depression in people living in the houses. Low levels of the 'cotton poison' may affect a brain centre involved in sleep-wake cycles, memory and anxiety, Hong Zhu revealed at the Experimental Biology 2002 meeting in New Orleans on Monday. © Nature News Service / Macmillan Magazines Ltd 2002

Keyword: Pain & Touch; Neurotoxins
Link ID: 1946 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Summarized by Robert W. Griffith, MD When I went to my local pharmacy to pick up my blood pressure medication refill I saw a prominent counter display for a new smell-test for Alzheimer's. I felt I had to look into this a bit further, and subsequently found quite a lot of relevant information. One important study published in the American Journal of Psychiatry in 2000 examined the predictive value of such a test in people with mildly reduced mental functioning. It would not be surprising if people with Alzheimer's (as well as those with other degenerative diseases of the brain, such as Parkinson's) would have a reduced sense of smell. In patients with Alzheimer's, microscopic examination of nerve cells supplying the olfactory (smell) tissues reveals the same changes as those seen in the nerve cells of the brain. The idea behind studying the sense of smell is to see if a loss of this function correlates with a corresponding loss of brain functioning, in parallel with the microscopic (i.e. structural) changes. If so, a 'smell-test' might be a simple test for Alzheimer's disease. * Olfactory deficits in patients with mild cognitive impairment predict Alzheimer's disease at follow-up. DP. Devanand, KS. Michaels-Marston, X. Liu, et al., Am J Psychiatry , 2000, vol. 157, pp. 1399--1405 Copyright © 2002 Novartis Foundation for Gerontology. All rights reserved

Keyword: Alzheimers; Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste)
Link ID: 1945 - Posted: 06.24.2010

DENVER, COLORADO--Every month, more than 6 million women in the United States suffer a migraine headache at the start of menstruation. Now, investigators believe they've identified a molecule that plays a key role in prompting the migraines. In the early 1980s, researchers determined that menstrual migraines were triggered by the sudden drop in estrogen levels that occurs just before menstruation begins. However, they had little idea how changing hormone levels triggered the headaches. Copyright © 2002 by the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Keyword: Hormones & Behavior; Pain & Touch
Link ID: 1943 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Dermot McGrath LONDON -- They are life's perennial questions: Pepsi or Coke, Mac or PC, cremation or burial? Scientists in the United Kingdom believe they may be close to unraveling some of the brain processes that ultimately dictate the choices we make as consumers. Using a revolutionary method of imaging the brain, researchers from the Open University (OU) and the London Business School say they have identified the brain region that becomes active as the shopper reaches to the supermarket shelf to make their final choice. © Copyright 2002, Lycos, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Keyword: Attention; Brain imaging
Link ID: 1942 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Stress hormones boost immunity crippled by drunken injuries HELEN PEARSON Raising lowered levels of stress hormones could help drunk patients in the emergency room by making up for the ill effects of alcohol on the immune system, the Experimental Biology 2002 meeting heard on Saturday. Of patients admitted to hospital with burns, "50% of them have booze on board", says burns expert Elizabeth Kovacs of the Loyola University Medical Center, Chicago. Drunk people are six times more likely to die after an accident. Alcohol followed by a burn is a dangerous cocktail for the immune system. The double whammy lowers levels of the hormone glucocorticoid. Normally glucocorticoid suppresses inflammation when it is no longer needed, shifting the immune system towards dealing with bacterial and viral infections. © Nature News Service / Macmillan Magazines Ltd 2002

Keyword: Stress; Neuroimmunology
Link ID: 1941 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Bad news for spice lovers: Chili actually reduces your ability to taste other flavors, according to researchers at the University of California, Davis. In a painful series of experiments that you may not want to try at home, graduate student Chris Simons put capsaicin -- the hot chemical from chili peppers -- on one side of volunteers' tongues. The volunteers then rinsed with solutions representing the five flavors of salty, sweet, sour, bitter and "umami," the flavor linked to monosodium glutamate, and rated the intensity of the flavor. "Capsaicin always suppressed sweetness, bitterness and umami. Saltiness and sourness weren't affected at all," Simons said.

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste); Pain & Touch
Link ID: 1940 - Posted: 04.23.2002

by Anjana Ahuja Does the existence of a criminal brain diminish the notion of personal responsibility? In the tranquil surroundings of Lake Davis in Florida, Keydrick Jordan shot 76-year-old Ann Mintner six times in a bungled robbery. Jordan was convicted of the murder, but nine months ago a jury spared him the death penalty. Its decision was swayed by medical scans showing that the murderer had brain damage. Jordan’s defence team coupled the images to horrific stories about his childhood: how his mother drank poison in an attempt to abort him; how he watched his stepfather kill a man; how he was forced to bathe in chicken blood in voodoo rituals; and how he was sexually abused, repeatedly, into his teens. “To me, the science was the thing that bore it out,” John Hall, a juror, told a newspaper at the time. “(Jordan) never had a chance to develop any moral instinct, not only because he didn’t have any role models, but because of his brain injury.” Copyright 2002 Times Newspapers Ltd.

Keyword: Aggression; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 1939 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By JESSICA KOVLER At 27, Ken Baker still had the sexual development of a child. He was pudgy, stubble-free and could pass for a high school freshman. At age 15, his development was brought to a halt by a marble-size tumor on his pituitary gland that went undiagnosed for over a decade. According to a study released by the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists, one in five people will develop a pituitary tumor. Only one-third of these will cause serious disorders. Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Hormones & Behavior; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 1938 - Posted: 04.23.2002

By ERIC NAGOURNEY Testosterone, often referred to as the male hormone, appears to play a role in maintaining mental sharpness as men age, researchers have found. After giving 300 older men a series of tests intended to measure skills like concentration and memory, the researchers found that the higher their testosterone level, the better the men did. Writing in the current issue of The Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, the lead author, Dr. Kristine Yaffe of the University of San Francisco, said the study looked at how much testosterone was actually available for the brain's use. Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Hormones & Behavior; Alzheimers
Link ID: 1937 - Posted: 04.23.2002

By HENRY FOUNTAIN The naked mole-rat is an odd beast. With its bare, pink skin and huge protruding incisors, this East African rodent is sometimes described as a hot dog with teeth. It spends most of its time in dark tunnels, so its vision is limited, but it can navigate both forward and backward with ease, aided by sensory hairs at either end. Socially, it is strange, too: with a single breeding queen supported by scores of workers, a mole-rat colony is the mammalian equivalent of a beehive. Now, it turns out, even its brain is weird. Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Pain & Touch; Evolution
Link ID: 1936 - Posted: 04.23.2002

A bad temper can lead to a risk of premature heart attack, scientists claim. Their comments are based on findings that young men who quickly react to stress with anger are three times more likely to develop heart disease. Research shows these men were five times more likely than their calmer counterparts to have an early heart attack, even without a family history of the condition. Some expressed their anger, others were able to conceal it, while many became irritable or engaged in "gripe sessions". Dr Patricia Chang, who co-ordinated the US-based research, said: "In this study, hot tempers predicted disease long before other traditional risk factors like diabetes and hypertension became apparent. (C) BBC

Keyword: Emotions; Stress
Link ID: 1935 - Posted: 04.22.2002

By Larry O'Hanlon, Discovery News — The best singers not only get all the chicks, but better health as well — at least among starlings. A new study has revealed that the better male starling crooners — preferred by females as mates — tend to have extra vigorous immune systems to fight off diseases. That's a trait any mother would want their offspring to have, said behavior researcher ornithologist Deborah Duffy, who just finished her doctoral work at Johns Hopkins University. Her paper on the matter appears in the April 22 issue of The Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Copyright © 2002 Discovery Communications Inc.

Keyword: Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 1934 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Lithium has been effective in the treatment of bipolar or manic depressive disease for more than 40 years yet scientists still don't understand fully how it works, that is, what target in the cell the lithium hit once it began circulating in the blood. Without this information, it is difficult to know how to create other, perhaps more effective drugs, or drugs that will work for patients who do not respond to lithium. A scientist who provided important insights into possible targets of lithium - and this year's recipient of the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology's Schering Plough Award -- will describe his current research on April 21 at the Experimental Biology 2002 meeting in New Orleans. Dr. John D. York, Howard Hughes Medical Institute Assistant Investigator, Duke University Medical Center, focuses on the elucidation of communication pathways between cells - a process called signaling - and the mechanisms by which defects in these pathways may lead to diseases such as manic depression and cancer. Dr. York is perhaps best known for identifying biological roles for "orphan" intracellular signaling molecules known in general as inositol polyphosphates, a discovery which changed how scientists regard inositol signaling and its possible impact on disease and the design of new therapies.

Keyword: Depression; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 1933 - Posted: 04.22.2002

Discovery that clocks in organs use different genes could impact postgenomic research and circadian medicine BOSTON, MA –The daily rhythms of the body—once thought to be strictly governed by a master clock lodged in the brain—appear to be driven to a remarkable degree by tiny timepieces pocketed in organs all over the body. What‘s more, these peripheral timepieces appear to be strikingly idiosyncratic in appearance—more like Swatch watches than classic Timexes. Clocks located in the liver and heart appear to use very different sets of genes to perform essentially the same functions, researchers at Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Public Health report in the April 21 Nature online. The study, among the first to explore circadian time mechanisms outside the brain, could have a potentially broad impact on the burgeoning fields of circadian medicine and postgenomic science. Clinicians have known for years that organs function at different rates—the heart beats, kidneys transport ions and electrolytes, the liver metabolizes lipids, sugars, and amino acids differently over the course of the day—and have used this knowledge to design more effective drug regimens for patients. A better understanding of what drives those local rhythms, and how they go wrong, could aid physicians’ efforts.

Keyword: Biological Rhythms
Link ID: 1932 - Posted: 06.24.2010

It may not strike twice but lightning can have long-term effects People who are struck by lightning could go on to develop rare disorders of the nervous system, say scientists. Research suggests some lightning-strike victims show signs of involuntary movement disorders (IMDs), such as uncontrollable blinking, tic-like movements resembling Tourette's syndrome, hand tremors and muscle spasms. These type of complications are normally found in people who have experienced other types of electric shocks, which damage the brain and the central nervous system. However researchers from the Lightning Data Center of St Anthony Hospital in Denver, USA, say they found four lightning-strike patients who developed similar symptoms. (C) BBC

Keyword: Brain Injury/Concussion; Tourettes
Link ID: 1931 - Posted: 04.22.2002

by Francesco Fiondella, BioMedNet News When nerves are severed by spinal cord injury, a tangle of long and branched molecules forms around them like "overgrown shrubbery," as one expert puts it, and prevents the damaged fibers from regenerating. Researchers now say that selectively pruning this molecular growth with chemicals results in "modest but significant" nerve regeneration in rat models, according to published and unpublished findings presented this week. A class of molecules known as chondroitin sulphate proteoglycans (CSPGs), a protein called Nogo, and another called myelin associated glycoprotein (MAG) are among the most studied of this molecular shrubbery shown to inhibit nerve regeneration. © Elsevier Science Limited 2002

Keyword: Regeneration; Brain Injury/Concussion
Link ID: 1930 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Lipitor ™ (atorvastatin), the most frequently used cholesterol lowering agent in the world, also has the ability to influence the immune system and proved effective in reversing paralysis in a mouse model of multiple sclerosis. Dr. Sawsan Youssef, a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Dr. Lawrence Steinman, Stanford University, reported the study on April 23 at the Experimental Biology 2002 meeting in New Orleans. Multiple sclerosis is caused by the immune system attacking the body’s own central nervous system, breaking down the myelin that sheathes and protects CNS nerves, impairing the body’s ability to move normally, and eventually causing paralysis. The T lymphocytes of the mice with which the research team worked are sensitized to brain antigens so that they produce an over-abundance of cytokines, pro-inflammatory chemicals that inflame the CNS, causing demylination of nerve sheaths through the same mechanism and in the same manner as happens in human multiple sclerosis. As in humans with MS, this mouse condition (called experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis or EAE) can occur in either an acute or relapsing form. The researchers found that oral treatment with lipitor could prevent both the acute and relapsing form of the multiple sclerosis-like disease in the mice, and could also reverse symptoms in mice with the ongoing chronic relapsing form of the disease.

Keyword: Multiple Sclerosis
Link ID: 1929 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Investigators at Howard University have recently observed the antidepressant effect of nicotine in Wistar-Kyoto (WKY) rats, a putative behavioral model of depression. Drs. Youssef Tizabi and K. Y. Tyler will present their findings at the Experimental Biology 2002 meeting in New Orleans on April 22. When compared to the general population, individuals with a history of clinical depression are more likely to smoke cigarettes. In addition, depressed patients often encounter difficulty in their smoking cessation efforts, which may partially be attributed to relapsed depressive episodes during withdrawal. Although cigarette smoke contains over 3,000 chemicals, nicotine is the primary constituent that acts on the brain. As a result, scientists have suggested that cigarette smoking may be an attempt by depressed individuals to self-medicate with nicotine. Depression is a major mental health disorder that is estimated to affect nearly 10 million American adults each year. Treatment of depressive illness, which includes various antidepressant medications and psychotherapy, is effective in 60-80 percent of patients. Despite the relative success of current antidepressant therapies, the precise cause of depression remains unclear. Animal models of depression, such as the WKY rat, are important research tools that can be used to screen potential antidepressant drugs and to study the underlying brain mechanisms involved in depression.

Keyword: Depression; Drug Abuse
Link ID: 1928 - Posted: 04.21.2002

Exposure to light can throw off your internal clock By Colette Bouchez HealthScoutNews Reporter THURSDAY, (HealthScoutNews) -- If a barking dog or noisy neighbors wake you up in the middle of the night, be sure to vent your anger in the darkness. New research shows that even short periods of light exposure in the middle of the night -- say more than an hour -- are enough to disrupt your circadian rhythm. That's important because your circadian rhythm is the natural biological clock that influences a wide number of physiological functions, as well as basic drives like sleep, hunger and sex. Copyright © 2002 ScoutNews, LLC. All rights reserved.

Keyword: Sleep; Biological Rhythms
Link ID: 1927 - Posted: 06.24.2010

In the old days, preschoolers had no more pressing business than to learn how to play. New research shows that they benefit from instruction in words and sounds By Barbara Kantrowitz and Pat Wingert NEWSWEEK When you walk through the brightly colored door of the Roseville Cooperative Preschool in northern California, you’re entering a magical, pint-size world where 3- and 4-year-olds are masters of the universe. At the science table, they use magnifying glasses to explore piles of flowers, cacti and shells. In the smock-optional art area, budding da Vincis often smear blotches of red, blue and yellow directly on the table. (It’s wiped off with a damp cloth when the next artist steps up.) There are ropes for climbing and two loft areas: one carpeted and filled with books and a dollhouse, and the other with a clear Plexiglas floor, perfect for keeping an eye on the activities below. There are no letters or numbers on the walls to distract from this focused play. The only rule, says director and founder Bev Bos, is that the kids are in control. “I tell other teachers, ‘Forget about kindergarten, first grade, second grade’,” she says. “We should be focusing on where children are right now.” SOUNDS LIKE AN IDYLLIC preschool learning environment, right? Wrong, according to a growing number of early-education researchers. Until quite recently, Bev Bos’s philosophy was the standard at preschools around the country, and there are still lots of teachers who passionately defend the idea that they should be helping kids feel secure and learn to play well with others, not learn the three Rs. But researchers now say the old approach ignores mounting evidence that many preschoolers need explicit instruction in the basics of literacy—the stuff most of us started to learn in first grade, how words fall on a page and the specific sounds and letters that make up words. New brain research shows that reading is part of a complex continuum that begins with baby talk and scribbles, and culminates in a child with a rich vocabulary and knowledge of the world. While some children acquire the literacy skills they need by osmosis, through their everyday experiences, many don’t. Most at risk are children of poverty, who are twice as likely to have serious trouble reading. But studies have also shown that at least 20 percent of middle-class children have reading disabilities and that early intervention could save many of them from a lifetime of playing catch-up. • MSNBC Terms, Conditions and Privacy © 2002

Keyword: Language; Dyslexia
Link ID: 1926 - Posted: 06.24.2010