Neuroscience

Stressful or traumatic experiences in childhood have been shown to negatively impact an individual’s health as an adult. Those affected face an increased risk of illness and often suffer from depression, anxiety disorders, and cardiovascular or metabolic diseases. Until now, little has been known about whether such experiences could contribute to the development of neurodegenerative diseases.

Why do our mental images stay sharp even when we are moving fast? A team of neuroscientists led by Professor Maximilian Jösch at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) has identified a mechanism that corrects visual distortions caused by movement in animals. The study, conducted in mice, identifies a core function that can be generalized across the vertebrate visual system, including primates such as humans. The findings are published in Nature Neuroscience.

Years before tau tangles show up in brain scans of patients with Alzheimer’s disease, a biomarker test developed at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine can detect small amounts of the clumping-prone tau protein and its misfolded pathological forms that litter the brain, cerebrospinal fluid and potentially blood, new research published today in Nature Medicine suggests.

Virginia Tech neuroscientists have uncovered a mitochondrial process that supports the brain cells critical for learning, memory, and social recognition.

Occupational exposure to noise and/or vibrations is associated with the presence of vertigo, according to a study recently published in the Journal of Clinical Medicine.

Researchers are paving the way for the design of bionic limbs that feel natural to users. They demonstrate the connection between hand movement patterns and motoneuron control patterns. The study, published in Science Robotics, also reports the application of these findings to a soft prosthetic hand, which was successfully tested by individuals with physical impairments.

Portable MRI (pMRI) technologies are rapidly transforming the landscape of neuroscience research, allowing neuroscientists to acquire brain data in community settings outside the hospital for the first time. But as neuroscientists increase access to MRI technology and move their research from a lab environment to broad community settings, they face novel ethical, legal, and societal issues (ELSI).

Some health problems, including chronic pain, inflammation and neurological diseases, can be treated by nerve stimulation, for example, with the help of electrodes that are attached to the ear and activate the vagus nerve. This method is sometimes referred to as an “electric pill.”

In a study published in Cell, a research team led by Zhu Shujia from the Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), along with Li Yang from the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica of CAS, has dissected the assembly and architecture of endogenous N-methyl-ᴅ-aspartate receptors (eNMDARs) in the adult mammalian cerebral cortex and hippocampus.

Imagine a swarm of fireflies, flickering lights on and off in the nighttime space. How does the human brain process and integrate information about duration and spatial position enabling this vision? This was the question addressed by Valeria Centanino, Gianfranco Fortunato, and Domenica Bueti from SISSA’s Cognitive Neuroscience group in their research published in Nature Communications.