PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Wake up your brain

Orexin wakes up your brain by self-excitation mechanism

2010-09-22
(Press-News.org) For advanced activities of our daily life (such as driving a car, or seeing a movie), to be awake is important. It has been known so far that neuropeptide in the brain called "Orexin"controls sleep and awakening besides appetite. Here, the research group led by Dr. Akihiro Yamanaka, National Institute for Physiological Sciences (NIPS), found that orexin-releasing neurons have the self-excitation mechanism that activate each other among them, and maintain awaking. From this result, the application to doze prevention or insomnia treatment can be expected. It is reported in the Journal of Neuroscience of the issue on September 22, 2010(the United States EST).

The research group focused on the orexin-releasing neurons in cerebral hypothalamus. They found that the orexin-releasing neurons not only release orexins, but also receive the stimulation of them via the orexin receptor (mainly orexin receptor type 2) and activate each other among them. This mechanism enables the orexin-releasing neurons to keep high level activity, and to maintain awaking. There was the established theory that"the orexin does not act on to the orexin neuron" from the original research result of its discovery, but this discovery overturns it.

By this study, Dr. Yamanaka clarified the nerve mechanism which maintains awakening or raises awakening level. It can be considered that maintaining the orexin neuron activity highly by this mechanism is one of the insomnia mechanisms. He believes that this study results can be applied to the doze prevention and the treatment of the insomnia in the future.

INFORMATION:

The Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST) supported this study.

END



ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Dancing robot swan triggers emotions

Dancing robot swan triggers emotions
2010-09-22
The Dying Swan is sometimes moving smoothly and gently, sometimes in a dramatic and fiery manner, as Tchaikovsky´s majestic music from the ballet Swan Lake is playing. Yet this is no ordinary ballet dancer, but a robot in the form of a swan, created at Mälardalen University and choreographed by professional dancer Åsa Unander-Scharin. The swan robot´s just over four-minute-long dance has so far been seen only by a select few. But it has already made a big impression. Tearful eyes and words like "touching", "fascinating" and "beautiful" are some of the reactions. - We ...

Paper highlights need for new studies and guidelines around oxygen therapy during MI

2010-09-22
Sophia Antipolis, 21 September 2010: The European Society of Cardiology (ESC) welcomes a paper published today in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC )(1) highlighting concerns over the use of oxygen therapy during MI in patients with normal oxygen levels. The publication adds to calls for revision of the STEMI guidelines around oxygen therapy and for a prospective, large scale randomised trials, issues that were both first raised in a Cochrane Review published in June (2). "The upcoming ESC Clinical Practice Guidelines for the management of STEMI, ...

Genomic 'haircut' makes world's tiniest genome even smaller: UBC research

2010-09-22
The world's tiniest nuclear genome appears to have "snipped off the ends" of its chromosomes and evolved into a lean, mean, genome machine that infects human cells, according to research published today by University of British Columbia scientists. Until recently, E. cuniculi, a parasitic fungus commonly found in rabbits that can also be fatal to immunocompromised humans, has been widely regarded as having the smallest known nuclear genome. At 2.9 millions base pairs (Mbp) and approximately 2,000 genes, the genome of E. cuniculi is less than one-two thousandth the size ...

Training the trainers: How to minimize stress when horses are first ridden

2010-09-22
The horse was domesticated many thousands of years ago and has been hugely important in the development of human civilization. It is hard to overstate its role in agriculture, in transport and communications and even in military operations. More recently, equestrian sports have gained markedly in popularity, so even though the horse has largely been superseded in modern farming and military practice its connection to man remains as close as ever. Nevertheless, the horse retains at least some aspects of its wild origins. It is clear that horses are frequently subjected ...

NIH study models H1N1 flu spread

2010-09-22
As the United States prepares for the upcoming flu season, a group of researchers supported by the National Institutes of Health continues to model how H1N1 may spread. The work is part of an effort, called the Models of Infectious Disease Agent Study (MIDAS), to develop computational models for conducting virtual experiments of how emerging pathogens could spread with and without interventions. The study involves more than 50 scientists with expertise in epidemiology, infectious diseases, computational biology, statistics, social sciences, physics, computer sciences ...

New research improves ability to detect malware in cloud-computing systems

2010-09-22
Researchers from North Carolina State University have developed new software that offers significantly enhanced security for cloud-computing systems. The software is much better at detecting viruses or other malware in the "hypervisors" that are critical to cloud computing, and does so without alerting the malware that it is being examined. Cloud computing is being hailed as a flexible, affordable way of offering computer resources to consumers. Under the cloud-computing paradigm, the computational power and storage of multiple computers is pooled, and can be shared by ...

MRI could be used for routine surveillance of great vessel stents

2010-09-22
Researchers have found that magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) may be sufficient for the routine surveillance of some great vessel (primary blood vessels [e.g., aorta and vena cavae]) stents that are commonly used to treat congenital heart defects (a defect in the structure of the heart and great vessels that is present at birth) in children and young adults, according to a study in the October issue of the American Journal of Roentgenology (www.ajronline.org). MRI is a noninvasive medical test that helps physicians diagnose and treat medical conditions. "Computed tomography ...

New therapy found for lung and skin cancer, based on suicide gene E

2010-09-22
Scientists at the University of Granada have developed a new therapy for the treatment of skin and lung cancer. This therapy involves the use of a suicide coliphage-gene (gene E) that can induce death to cells transfected with it.. Their studies have demostrated that this technique is not only effective in vitro (using tumour cell cultures), but also in vivo through the use of experimental animals in which tumours were induced. Although further research is required, the results obtained at the University of Granada revealed gene E's intensive antitumour activity, which ...

First observation of the folding of a nucleic acid

2010-09-22
The prediction of the structure and function of biological macromolecules (i.e., the machinery of life) is of foremost importance in the field of structural biology. Since the elucidation of the three-dimensional structure of DNA (the molecule that carries all genetic information) by Watson and Crick, scientists have strived to decipher the hidden code that determines the evolution of the spatial arrangement of these molecules towards their functional native state. Attempts to follow these structural transitions experimentally and with atomic resolution are hampered by ...

'Halfalogue': Overheard cell-phone conversations are not only annoying but reduce our attention

2010-09-22
"Yeah, I'm on my way home." "That's funny." "Uh-huh." "What? No! I thought you were – " "Oh, ok." Listening to someone talk on a cell phone is very annoying. A new study published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, finds out why: Hearing just one side of a conversation is much more distracting than hearing both sides and reduces our attention in other tasks. Lauren Emberson, a psychology Ph.D. candidate at Cornell University, came up with the idea for the study when she was taking the bus as an undergraduate student at the ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

New jab protects babies from serious lung infection, study shows

July Tip Sheet from Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center

Current application status and innovative development of surgical robot

Counterfeited in China: New book assesses state of industry and its future

Machine learning reveals historical seismic events in the Yellowstone caldera

First analyses of Myanmar earthquake conclude fault ruptured at supershear velocity

Curved fault slip captured on CCTV during Myanmar earthquake

Collaboration rewarded for work to further deployment of batteries in emerging economies

Heart-healthy habits also prevent cancer, Alzheimer’s, COPD, other diseases, Emory study finds

Scientists will use a $1M grant to build a support system addressing sea level rise and flooding in South Florida

New research examines how pH impacts the immune system

Inhaled agricultural dust disrupts gut health

New study reveals hidden regulatory roles of “junk” DNA

Taking the sting out of ulcerative colitis

Deep life’s survival secret: Crustal faulting generates key energy sources, study shows

Idaho National Laboratory to lead advancements in US semiconductor manufacturing

AI-assisted sorting, other new technologies could improve plastic recycling

More than just larks and owls!

Call for nominations: 2026 Dan David Prize

New tool gives anyone the ability to train a robot

Coexistence of APC and KRAS mutations in familial adenomatous polyposis and endometrial cancer: A mini-review with case-based perspective

First global-to-local study reveals stark health inequalities from COVID-19 in 2020–2021

rcssci: Simplifying complex data relationships with enhanced visual clarity

Why some ecosystems collapse suddenly—and others don’t

One-third of U.S. public schools screen students for mental health issues

GLP-1 RA use and survival among older adults with cancer and type 2 diabetes

Trends in physician exit from fee-for-service Medicare

Systematic investigation of tumor microenvironment and antitumor immunity with IOBR

Common feature between forest fires and neural networks reveals the universal framework underneath

New R package revolutionizes gene set enrichment analysis visualization for biomedical research

[Press-News.org] Wake up your brain
Orexin wakes up your brain by self-excitation mechanism