September 11, 2024 by Jennifer Michalowski, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Credit: Current Biology (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2024.08.004 Placebos are inert treatments, generally not expected to impact biological pathways or improve a person’s physical health. But time and again, some patients report that they feel better after taking a placebo. Increasingly, doctors and scientists are recognizing that...
September 11, 2024 by Wiley Myelin sheath. Credit: Wikipedia.The neurons of the brain are protected by an insulating layer called myelin. In certain diseases like multiple sclerosis, this protective layer is damaged and lost, leading to death of neurons and disability. New research published in The FEBS Journal reveals the importance of a protein called...
News Release 10-Sep-2024 Peer-Reviewed PublicationNetherlands Institute for Neuroscience – KNAW image: Infographic hallucinations Credit: Eline Feenstra – Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience A new study from the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience shows how flickering light can cause hallucinations in our brain: it produces ‘standing waves’ of brain activity. You’re sitting on the bus or train and...
News Release 10-Sep-2024 FAU researchers gain major insights into how our brains workPeer-Reviewed PublicationFriedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg In a pioneering study, the two scientists Dr. Patrick Krauss and Dr. Achim Schilling from the Cognitive Computational Neuroscience Group at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) have now used artificial intelligence to gain major insights into how our brains work that may...
September 10, 2024 by VIB (the Flanders Institute for Biotechnology) Credit: Cell Reports (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.celrep.2024.114719Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, is the most common degenerative motor neuron disease in adults. It is characterized by a selective loss of motor neurons, resulting in progressive muscle weakness and paralysis, as well as...
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY NEWS The human body’s sense of touch is so important it can be found throughout the body, not just on the skin. Skin – illustrative photo. Image credit: Pixabay (Free Pixabay license) Two tiny sensors of touch, Piezo1 and Piezo2, signal the lightest pressures and can be found monitoring the circulatory system,...
06 September 2024 ‘Sneeze neurons’ activated by triggers such as pollen or a viral infection send an achoo signal, whereas cough neurons induce a hack. The cough triggered by pollen and other allergens is activated by neurons distinct from those that lead to a sneeze.Credit: Getty Does a whiff of pollen trigger a sneeze or...
In animal models, even low stimulation currents can sometimes still cause electrographic seizures, researchers found.David Orenstein | The Picower Institute for Learning and MemoryPublication Date:September 6, 2024 Caption:In hope of finding a thalamic stimulation current level that wouldn’t trigger seizures, researchers progressively titrated current (horizontal axis).Credits:Image: Brown Lab/MIT Picower Institute The idea of electrically stimulating...
News Release 9-Sep-2024 University of Michigan researchers use propofol to uncover the interactions between the thalamus and cortex that underlie consciousness Peer-Reviewed PublicationMichigan Medicine – University of Michigan In hospital operating rooms and intensive care units, propofol is a drug of choice, widely used to sedate patients for their comfort or render them fully unconscious...
September 5, 2024 by University of California – San Diego These brain scans show different neural signatures associated with pain response: the NAPS (left) is associated with the emotional experience of pain, the SIIPS-1 (center) is related to our expectations of pain and other psychosocial factors, and the NPS (right) is associated with pain intensity....
