160 news posts in Neuroscience

Neuroscience

08 Apr 2016

Feeling helpless when under stress?

Stress – we’re all too familiar with it. More of us than ever are feeling the relentless pressure of busy lives and it is taking its toll. In the US, stress related ailments cost the nation $300 billion every year in medical bills and lost productivity. But it seems some people are able to cope with this problem much better than others. Some individuals are resilient, while others succumb to despair. The reason, scientists have discovered, is all in the brain. Mapping the brain activity in mice when placed under stress, scientists have found that mice showing helpless behavior had vastly different brain activity from those displaying resilient behavior. Certain patterns were revealed in the stressed brain and the scientists identified a list of brain areas that might have a critical role to play in stress-induced depression. Looking at these brain activities the study, published in Frontiers in Neural Circuits, opens up possibilities for identifying new targets for the treatment of depression. They explain that with the exception of a few brain areas, “mice showing ‘helpless’ behavior had an overall brain-wide reduction in the level of neuronal activation compared with mice showing ‘resilient’ behavior.” “In addition, the helpless mice showed […]

Neuroscience

07 Apr 2016

Imitation as therapy for Alzheimer’s patients

By K.E.D. Coan, Science Writer Alzheimer’s disease is the sixth leading cause of death in the U.S., according to the Alzheimer’s Association. There is no cure and no way to slow or prevent the illness. But, patients can still benefit from both physical and cognitive rehabilitation, and researchers are learning that mimicry may be a useful tool to help them regain lost abilities. “Alzheimer’s patients are still able to voluntarily imitate the movement of an object, as well as that of a human being” said Dr. Ambra Bisio. “If this ability is still in place, a patient could relearn how to perform actions that have become difficult due to the disease.” Dr. Ambra Bisio is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Experimental Medicine at the University of Genoa. She specializes in how the brain responds to movement, particularly somebody else’s movements. In a collaboration with Professor Thierry Pozzo at INSERM-U1093, she showed that Alzheimer’s patients can still mimic a simple gesture by a human or a moving dot on a computer screen, suggesting that such exercises may complement current therapeutic strategies. Their results were published in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience. Copying what someone else is doing is a basic […]

Neuroscience

14 Mar 2016

Highlights from the Winter Conference on Neural Plasticity (WCNP)

by Jochen Meier, Frontiers in Molecular Neuroscience, Specialty Chief Editor Aloha: Thanks to the Frontiers Travel Award I am providing herewith an overview and some highlights of the Winter Conference on Neural Plasticity WCNP, Sunday January 31 – Friday February 05, Maui Hawaii. Janelle C. LeBoutillier and Ted L. Petit again did a great job and organized this conference which took place at the Sheraton Hotel Ka’anapali (see: http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~wcnp/ ). It was an intriguing international conference with approximately 75 participants from all over the world. This post shall provide an overview of recent research highlights covering network, systems and behavioral neuroscience with particular focus on learning and memory, as well as cellular and molecular mechanisms of neural plasticity in health and disease. However, due to confidentiality issues this blog can unfortunately not be exhaustive, but all the contributions blogged here are authorized. Sunday – New Concepts The conference started out with the New Concepts Session on Sunday evening and covered heterogeneous topics. Michel Chopp was giving some exciting insights into exosome/miR therapy for neural injury after TBI, showing that the miRNA content of exosomes derived from MSCs promote neurovascular remodeling and recovery after TBI. Eric Dumont spoke about the role […]

Neuroscience

01 Feb 2016

VIDEO: Scientist’s work plays leading role in redefining our understanding of the brain’s systems

By Ben Stockton With a wish to not appear immodest, Professor Pierre Magistretti tentatively indicates two moments that have shaped his career. The first came with the surprise that lactate, more typically associated with insufficient blood supply to muscle, was being produced by the support cells of the brain, known as glia or astrocytes, and used as an energy source for neurons. “Neurons can send messages to glial cells and tell them, “please get us some energy,”” and this arrives in the form of lactate, explains Magistretti. It recently became apparent that lactate had further implications in the brain. Magistretti and his peers are now “fully engaged in understanding how this lactate is not only an energy substrate but also a signal for plasticity and memory,” which has become a cornerstone of his current work. Magistretti, a Professor at the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia and at the Brain Mind Institute at EPFL in Lausanne, could be excused for immodesty. His contribution to the field of brain energy metabolism have seen him awarded with the IPSEN Neuronal Plasticity prize and he currently presides over the International Brain Research Organization. Amongst this, he lends his expertise […]

Neuroscience

14 Dec 2015

VIDEO: Scientist views the human brain as a scientific adventure

Frontiers Science Hero: Egidio D’Angelo from Frontiers on Vimeo. For Prof. Egidio D’Angelo the brain provides many challenges that are waiting to be resolved, but for him it is like going on an adventure. “In many parts of the brain, you follow a track that moves from cellular and molecular properties up to microcircuit and into the complexity of brain connectivity. Investigating the brain is an adventure that, for a scientist, means connecting the lower level to the higher level of brain functioning. This is one of the most rewarding and interesting aspects of my work,” he said. D’Angelo has been a Professor of Physiology at the University of Pavia in Italy since 2006. He is teaching Physiology, Neurobiology and Neuroscience. D’Angelo is also the Specialty Field Chief Editor of Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience, a multidisciplinary open-access journal devoted to better understanding the cellular mechanisms underlying the functions of the cells composing the nervous system across all species. D’Angelo and his team started by investigating the synaptic properties of the mossy fiber – granule cell synapse of cerebellum, with particular regard to the functional role of NMDA receptors. One of his research highlights includes the investigation of the cellular physiology […]

Neuroscience

20 Nov 2015

Staff Pick: Understanding auditory hallucinations

Laurence Pope is a Journal Operations Specialist at Frontiers. He studied biochemistry and science communication at Imperial College London before joining Frontiers in 2013. His staff pick this week comes from Frontiers in Human Neuroscience: The role of the primary auditory cortex in the neural mechanism of auditory verbal hallucinations. “We often assume that only people with schizophrenia and other mental disorders experience auditory hallucinations (or ‘hearing voices’). In fact about 5% of mentally healthy people also hear voices, but these people can control how they respond to them, such as ignore them or record what they hear. It’s these people who may ultimately hold the key to better management of schizophrenia. “The authors of this study found that such people have a better ability to regulate their primary auditory cortex, the area of the brain responsible for processing sound, compared to people with schizophrenia. When auditory hallucinations occur mentally healthy people can direct their attention outwards, while people with schizophrenia have difficulty focusing on external sounds and direct their attention inwards. “These discoveries help bring us closer to understanding how auditory hallucinations occur and why such hallucinations affect people differently.”

Neuroscience

07 Oct 2015

Join us in Chicago at the Neuroscience 2015 Conference

Going to #SfN15 in Chicago, United-States? Meet Frontiers at Neuroscience 2015 this October 17 – 21! Come chat with us about Open Access publishing, interactive peer-review, becoming an editor, or about hosting your very own Research Topic! A Research Topic allows you to spotlight your area of research by editing a collection of cutting-edge peer-reviewed articles. For example, take a look at this very successful Research Topic in Frontiers in Neuroscience: Neuroinflammation and behaviour has had over 48’000 views and is available as a freely downloadable e-book! You can learn more about Research Topics in this brochure. We are looking forward to seeing you at #SfN15!

Neuroscience

02 Sep 2015

STAFF PICK: Neuroscience perspectives on Security: Technology, Detection, and Decision Making

Meet Nikolaos Anagnostos. Nikolaos is a production coordinator who has been with Frontiers since 2011. As part of the production team, he sees a lot of articles come through and helps manage them along the way. His staff pick is an e-book, which is a collection of articles that were the result of a Frontiers Research Topic. The e-book is free to download. Below is why he chose this e-book. E-Book Staff Pick: Neuroscience perspectives on Security: Technology, Detection, and Decision Making Edited by: Elena Rusconi, Kenneth C. Scott-Brown, Andrea Szymkowiak From tracing the neural markers of successful lying and discussing the potential use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) as a lie detector in criminal courts, to a debate on whether non-invasive brain stimulation should be used in security and military services and a closer look at CCTV operators or at an X-ray security scanner offering multiple views of objects as image sequences: the articles included in this e-book present a wide range of security science topics, while examining the multiple social and ethical questions that arise. Personally, I found it interesting to read how much effort is done to overcome the artificial environment that is inherent in these experimental […]

Neuroscience

23 Apr 2015

New Research Topic: Neuropsychology through the lenses of computational modelling

NEW RESEARCH TOPIC: Are you passionate about computational modelling of neuropsychological disorders? Do you research different levels of modelling (from spiking neurons to higher-level connectionist modeling ) using imaging and behavioral data? Then this topic is for you. “Neuropsychology through the lenses of computational modelling”, is a new Research Topic open for submissions in Frontiers in ‪#‎ComputationalNeuroscience‬. Read more: https://lnkd.in/eBb3Wi9

Neuroscience

02 Apr 2014

World Autism Awareness Day 2014

On World Autism Awareness Day (April 2) we present a selection of popular open-access articles on advances and theories into autism spectrum disorders (ASD) The Intense World Theory – a unifying theory of the neurobiology of autism Frontiers in Human Neuroscience (Kamila Markram and Henry Markram (Co-founders of Frontiers and CEO and Editor-in-Chief, respectively)) The Intense World Theory considers autism as the consequence of a supercharged brain that makes the world more intense, which causes people with autism to develop strategies to cope. This review highlights key studies that support this theory and show how it can better explain past findings, and how it could resolve apparently conflicting data and interpretations. Autism: The Micro-Movement Perspective Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience (Elizabeth B Torres, Maria Brincker, Robert W Isenhower, Polina Yanovich, Kimberly A Stigler, John I Nurnberger, Dimitri N Metaxas and Jorge V Jose) A new screening and tracking tool for diagnosing autism is detailed in this study. It measures an autistic person’s random movements and compares these to patterns seen in non-autistic individuals. The method could be used to diagnose autism sooner and allow earlier intervention. Network efficiency in autism spectrum disorder and its relation to brain overgrowth Frontiers in Human Neuroscience (John D Lewis, […]