http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. (Medical Xpress)—Scientists from the United States and Australia have advanced our understanding of brain plasticity by showing that the brain forms complex new circuits after damage, often far from the damaged site, to compensate for lost function. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-05-evidence-brains-re-wire-injury.html Neuroscience Wed, 15 May 2013 09:30:06 EST news287827520 Evidence indicates that the accumulation of amyloid-beta proteins, which form the plaques found in the brains of Alzheimer's patients, is critical for the development of Alzheimer's disease, which impacts 5.4 million Americans. And not just the quantity, but also the quality of amyloid-beta peptides is crucial for Alzheimer's initiation. The disease is triggered by an imbalance in two different amyloid species—in Alzheimer's patients, there is a reduction in a relative level of healthy amyloid-beta 40 compared to 42. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-brain-alzheimer-disease.html Alzheimer's disease & dementia Thu, 18 Apr 2013 11:50:27 EST news285504615 Do you ever wake up with a raging hangover and picture the row of brain cells that you suspect have have started to decay? Or wonder whether that final glass of wine was too much for those tiny cells, and pushed you over the line? http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-03-alcohol-braincells-medical-myth.html Health Tue, 12 Mar 2013 09:25:18 EST news282299086 The flip of a single molecular switch helps create the mature neuronal connections that allow the brain to bridge the gap between adolescent impressionability and adult stability. Now Yale School of Medicine researchers have reversed the process, recreating a youthful brain that facilitated both learning and healing in the adult mouse. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-03-flip-molecular-brain-young.html Neuroscience Wed, 06 Mar 2013 12:00:11 EST news281792897 Neuroscientists should help to develop compelling digital games that boost brain function and improve well-being, say two professors specializing in the field in a commentary article published in the science journal Nature. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-scientists-urge-game-brain.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 27 Feb 2013 17:56:34 EST news281210187 We should reconsider how we use antidepressants more effectively. The latest studies have shown that antidepressants restore the capacity of certain areas of the brain to repair abnormal neural pathways. According to neuroscientist Eero Castrén, the recipient of EUR 2.5 million of ERC funding, recovery requires redirection of these pathways through practice, rehabilitation or therapy. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-antidepressants.html Psychology & Psychiatry Fri, 22 Feb 2013 09:38:20 EST news280748191 Restoring vision might sometimes be as simple as turning out the lights. That's according to a study reported on February 14 in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, in which researchers examined kittens with a visual impairment known as amblyopia before and after they spent 10 days in complete darkness. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-vision-total-darkness.html Neuroscience Thu, 14 Feb 2013 13:13:16 EST news280069972 Animals that are socially isolated for prolonged periods make less myelin in the region of the brain responsible for complex emotional and cognitive behavior, researchers at the University at Buffalo and Mt. Sinai School of Medicine report in Nature Neuroscience online. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-brain-plasticity-social-isolation-disrupts.html Neuroscience Sun, 11 Nov 2012 13:00:40 EST news271860226 (Medical Xpress)—Heavy drinking during pregnancy disrupts proper brain development in children and adolescents years after they were exposed to alcohol in the womb, according to a study supported by the National Institutes of Health. The study is the first to track children over several years to examine how heavy exposure to alcohol in utero affects brain growth over time. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-heavy-prenatal-alcohol-consumption-linked.html Neuroscience Thu, 01 Nov 2012 07:01:23 EST news270972033 New research links motor skills and perception, specifically as it relates to a second finding—a new understanding of what the left and right brain hemispheres "hear." Georgetown University Medical Center researchers say these findings may eventually point to strategies to help stroke patients recover their language abilities, and to improve speech recognition in children with dyslexia. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-what-you-hear-could-depend.html Neuroscience Sun, 14 Oct 2012 17:17:01 EST news269453812 A new study in animals shows that chronic stress during pregnancy prevents brain benefits of motherhood, a finding that researchers suggest could increase understanding of postpartum depression. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-chronic-stress-pregnancy-brain-benefits.html Psychology & Psychiatry Sun, 14 Oct 2012 05:50:52 EST news269412616 A lot is being written about the effects of social media on the brain, how it may be changing the neural circuitry, shortening attention spans and reducing deep thinking and creativity. A group of researchers at Rutgers University in Newark, however, point out that as of date there is little hard science to prove how social media may be changing the brain's neural networks. What is known is that social media is now firmly part of our society and we have the choice to control it or not. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-social-media-mind-neuroscience-hype.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 29 Aug 2012 08:25:26 EST news265447517 (Medical Xpress)—By administering a simple behavioral test, Yale researchers were able to predict which mice would later exhibit alcoholism-related behaviors such as the inability to stop seeking alcohol and a tendency to relapse, the scientists report in the Aug. 26 issue of the journal Nature Neuroscience. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-behavioral-future-problems-alcohol.html Neuroscience Mon, 27 Aug 2012 08:29:22 EST news265274950 Astrocytes are cells that have many functions in the central nervous system, such as the control of neuronal synapses, blood flow, or the brain's response to neurotrauma or stroke. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-astrocytes-neurons-neural-stem-cells.html Medical research Fri, 24 Aug 2012 10:50:01 EST news265021544 (Medical Xpress) -- People with a curious condition that causes them to apply make-up on only one side of their face, or ignore food on half of their plate, are playing a new role in understanding stroke recovery. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-patients.html Neuroscience Mon, 21 May 2012 06:39:39 EST news256801169 Chronic exposure to cocaine reduces the expression of a protein known to regulate brain plasticity, according to new, in vivo research on the molecular basis of cocaine addiction. That reduction drives structural changes in the brain, which produce greater sensitivity to the rewarding effects of cocaine. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-chronic-cocaine-triggers-brain-neuron.html Neuroscience Wed, 09 May 2012 17:13:46 EST news255802413 Cognitive decline is a pressing global health care issue. Worldwide, one case of dementia is detected every seven seconds. Mild cognitive impairment is a well recognized risk factor for dementia, and represents a critical window of opportunity for intervening and altering the trajectory of cognitive decline in seniors. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-trajectory-cognitive-decline-seniors-dementia.html Alzheimer's disease & dementia Mon, 23 Apr 2012 16:00:05 EST news254397828 The proficiency that a bilingual person has of both languages, the context in which he speaks them or unconscious changes in their use are the factors that make people who speak Spanish and Catalan switch from one language to another. The group of Cognition and Brain Plasticity at the Bellvitge Biomedical Research Institute (IDIBELL), led by Antoni Rodríguez-Fornells, has designed a questionnaire that allows understanding individual differences among bilinguals when they change the language (switching). http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-language-bilinguals.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 14 Feb 2012 10:02:11 EST news248436123 If you are pregnant, here's another reason to work out: you will reduce the chances of your new baby developing neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer's, later in life. A new research report published online in The FASEB Journal shows that mice bred to develop a neurodegenerative disease roughly equivalent to Alzheimer's disease showed fewer signs of the disease and greater brain plasticity later in life when their mothers exercised regularly than those whose mothers did not exercise. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-pregnant-women-offspring-long-term-neurodegenerative.html Health Mon, 26 Sep 2011 09:50:45 EST news236249413 Scientists have known for years that neurogenesis takes place throughout adulthood in the hippocampus of the mammalian brain. Now Columbia researchers have found that under stressful conditions, neural stem cells in the adult hippocampus can produce not only neurons, but also new stem cells. The brain stockpiles the neural stem cells, which later may produce neurons when conditions become favorable. This response to environmental conditions represents a novel form of brain plasticity. The findings were published online in Neuron on June 9, 2011. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-brain-environmental.html Neuroscience Mon, 13 Jun 2011 13:11:14 EST news227188831 The brain is apparently programmed from birth to develop the ability to determine sunrise and sunset, new research on circadian rhythms at the University of Chicago shows. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-04-brain-difference-night-day.html Neuroscience Thu, 28 Apr 2011 15:06:01 EST news223221918 (PhysOrg.com) -- The healthy brain has balance of excitatory and inhibitory signals that stimulate activity but also keep it under control. Some brain diseases, like autism and Down's syndrome, have too much inhibition, which impairs cognitive functions. Reducing inhibition appears to improve cognition, and it can restore juvenile plasticity in the adult brain, making it more adaptable. Scientists want to recapture this plasticity to enhance recovery from stroke or brain injury and to treat people suffering from developmental or degenerative brain disorders. Now, a new MIT study using a common antidepressant that coincidentally reduces neural inhibition shows how this "disinhibition" works in ways that might be used therapeutically. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-04-disinhibition-brain-plasticity.html Neuroscience Tue, 12 Apr 2011 07:14:10 EST news221811191