http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. In our interaction with our environment we constantly refer to past experiences stored as memories to guide behavioral decisions. But how memories are formed, stored and then retrieved to assist decision-making remains a mystery. By observing whole-brain activity in live zebrafish, researchers from the RIKEN Brain Science Institute have visualized for the first time how information stored as long-term memory in the cerebral cortex is processed to guide behavioral choices. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-05-visualize-memory-formation-zebrafish.html Neuroscience Thu, 16 May 2013 12:00:01 EST news287923163 During fetal development of the mammalian brain, the cerebral cortex undergoes a marked expansion in surface area in some species, which is accommodated by folding of the tissue in species with most expanded neuron numbers and surface area. Researchers have now identified a key regulator of this crucial process. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-brain.html Neuroscience Fri, 26 Apr 2013 09:50:02 EST news286187686 Researchers have given rats the ability to "touch" infrared light, normally invisible to them, by fitting them with an infrared detector wired to microscopic electrodes implanted in the part of the mammalian brain that processes tactile information. The achievement represents the first time a brain-machine interface has augmented a sense in adult animals, said Duke University neurobiologist Miguel Nicolelis, who led the research team. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-neuroprosthesis-rats-ability-infrared.html Neuroscience Tue, 12 Feb 2013 11:40:01 EST news279891120 (Medical Xpress)—It has long been known that the part of the brain called the amygdala is responsible for recognition of a threat and knowing whether to fight or flee from the danger. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-response-recovery-brain-well-being.html Neuroscience Tue, 05 Feb 2013 07:20:01 EST news279269710 (Medical Xpress)—Neurobiologists at the Research institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP) in Vienna have discovered one of the key genes required to make a brain. Mutations in this gene, called TUBB5, cause neurodevelopmental disease in children. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-key-gene-brain.html Genetics Fri, 14 Dec 2012 07:17:37 EST news274691841 (Medical Xpress)—Stanford University School of Medicine scientists have shown that a structure deep within the brain is a crucial component of recurring seizures that can arise as a delayed consequence of a cerebral stroke. This structure, called the thalamus, is known as a relay station routing inputs from the senses to the brain's higher cognitive processing centers in the cerebral cortex. But the thalamus has never before been implicated in post-stroke seizures. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-rats-stroke-induced-seizures-pulse.html Neuroscience Thu, 08 Nov 2012 07:10:01 EST news271579727 A team of neuroscientists has proposed a new and potentially revolutionary way of obtaining a neuronal connectivity map (the "connectome") of the whole brain of the mouse. The details are set forth in an essay published October 23 in the open-access journal PLOS Biology. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-neuroscientists-revolutionary-dna-based-approach-wiring.html Neuroscience Tue, 23 Oct 2012 17:10:01 EST news270224877 The brain's key "breeder" cells, it turns out, do more than that. They secrete substances that boost the numbers and strength of critical brain-based immune cells believed to play a vital role in brain health. This finding adds a new dimension to our understanding of how resident stem cells and stem cell transplants may improve brain function. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-natural-brain-immune-cells-tissue.html Neuroscience Sun, 21 Oct 2012 13:00:17 EST news270017832 Researchers at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) have solved an important piece of one of neuroscience's outstanding puzzles: how progenitor cells in the developing mammalian brain reproduce themselves while also giving birth to neurons that will populate the emerging cerebral cortex, the seat of cognition and executive function in the mature brain. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-09-protein-key-fate-decision-cortical.html Neuroscience Fri, 21 Sep 2012 13:05:30 EST news267451518 The blood-brain barrier -- the filter that governs what can and cannot come into contact with the mammalian brain -- is a marvel of nature. It effectively separates circulating blood from the fluid that bathes the brain, and it keeps out bacteria, viruses and other agents that could damage it. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-blood-brain-barrier-blocks-forged-human.html Medical research Sun, 24 Jun 2012 13:50:01 EST news259758396 The discovery, using state-of-the-art informatics tools, increases the likelihood that it will be possible to predict much of the fundamental structure and function of the brain without having to measure every aspect of it. That in turn makes the Holy Grail of modelling the brain in silico -- the goal of the proposed Human Brain Project -- a more realistic, less Herculean, prospect. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-door-neuroscience.html Neuroscience Wed, 11 Apr 2012 17:00:10 EST news253379203 Quite early in its development, the mammalian brain has all the raw materials on hand to forge complex neural networks. But forming the connections that make these intricate networks so exquisitely functional is a process that occurs one synapse at a time. An important question for neuroscience has been: how exactly do stable synapses form? How do nerve cells of particular types know which of their cortical neighbors to "synapse" with, and which to leave out of their emerging networks? http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-gaba-prunes-copious-provisional-synapses.html Neuroscience Tue, 03 Jan 2012 17:51:01 EST news244835451 When the activity of a molecule that is normally elevated during viral infections is inhibited in the brain, mice learn and remember better, researchers at Baylor College of Medicine reported in a recent article in the journal Cell. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-neuroscientists-boost-memory-genetics-memory-enhancing.html Neuroscience Thu, 08 Dec 2011 13:00:42 EST news242571591 Each taste, from sweet to salty, is sensed by a unique set of neurons in the brains of mice, new research reveals. The findings demonstrate that neurons that respond to specific tastes are arranged discretely in what the scientists call a "gustotopic map." This is the first map that shows how taste is represented in the mammalian brain. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-brain-tongue.html Neuroscience Thu, 01 Sep 2011 14:01:20 EST news234103898 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