Neuroscience

Restoring nerve-muscle communication in ALS

Patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, lose muscle control as nerve cells or neurons in the brain and spinal cord degenerate and can no longer send signals to muscles. Previous ...

Medical research

Scientists unveil how general anesthesia works

Hailed as one of the most important medical advances, the discovery of general anesthetics—compounds that induce unconsciousness, prevent control of movement and block pain—helped transform dangerous and traumatic operations ...

Parkinson's & Movement disorders

New mechanism behind Parkinson's disease revealed

Parkinson's disease is a debilitating neurological illness that affects approximately 10 million people worldwide. It is marked by a progressive decline in physical function, the most iconic being uncontrollable tremors, ...

Neuroscience

Tackling neurotransmission precision

Behind all motor, sensory and memory functions, calcium ions are in the brain, making those functions possible. Yet neuroscientists do not entirely understand how fast calcium ions reach their targets inside neurons, and ...

Alzheimer's disease & dementia

Looking for origins of Alzheimer's disease to find a treatment

Six or so years ago, Frank Longo, MD, PhD, Stanford's chair of neurology and neurological sciences, was optimistic that a treatment for Alzheimer's disease was on its way. More than a decade earlier, pharmaceutical companies ...

Neuroscience

Blame it on the astrocytes

In the brains of all vertebrates, information is transmitted through synapses, a mechanism that allows an electric or chemical signal to be passed from one brain cell to another. Chemical synapses, which are the most abundant ...

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