Studying the networks of connections in the brains of people affected by schizophrenia, bipolar disease or depression has allowed Dr. Peter Williamson, from Western University, to gain a better understanding of the biological basis of these important diseases. Dr. Williamson and colleagues have shown that different networks, found specifically in humans, are disrupted in different psychiatric diseases. These results were presented at the 2013 Canadian Neuroscience Meeting, the annual meeting of the Canadian Association for Neuroscience - Association Canadienne des Neurosciences ...

VIDEO: Researchers at the University of Rochester have found that a simple visual task can predict IQ. In the study, individuals watched video clips of black and white bars moving across... Click here for more information. A brief visual task can predict IQ, according to a new study. This surprisingly simple exercise measures the brain's unconscious ability to filter out visual movement. The study shows that individuals whose brains are better at automatically suppressing ...

PHILADELPHIA — Frequent heartburn was positively associated with cancers of the throat and vocal cord among nonsmokers and nondrinkers, and the use of antacids, but not prescription medications, had a protective effect, according to data published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research. "Previous studies examining gastric reflux and cancers of the head and neck have generated mixed results," said Scott M. Langevin, Ph.D., postdoctoral research fellow at Brown University in Providence, R.I. "Most of those ...

Madrid, 23 May 2013.- CNIC researchers have discovered that the daily clearance of neutrophils from the body stimulates the release of hematopoietic stem cells from the bone marrow into the bloodstream, according to a report published today in the journal Cell. Neutrophils are leukocytes (white blood cells) that defend the body against attack from bacteria and other disease organisms. To perform their function, these cells release toxic substances when they come into contact with microorganisms. However, release of these substances in the wrong place by damaged neutrophils ...

With this new view of a spectacular stellar nursery ESO is celebrating 15 years of the Very Large Telescope — the world's most advanced optical instrument. This picture reveals thick clumps of dust silhouetted against the pink glowing gas cloud known to astronomers as IC 2944. These opaque blobs resemble drops of ink floating in a strawberry cocktail, their whimsical shapes sculpted by powerful radiation coming from the nearby brilliant young stars. This new picture celebrates an important anniversary for the Very Large Telescope - it is fifteen years since the first ...

LA JOLLA, CA – May 23, 2013 – Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have devised a powerful new technique for finding antibodies that have a desired biological effect. Antibodies, which can bind to billions of distinct targets, are already used in many of the world's best-selling medicines, diagnostics and laboratory reagents. The newly reported technique should greatly speed the process of discovering such products. "For the first time, we have a selection method whose power matches the vast diversity of the antibody repertoire," said Richard A. Lerner, ...

Tomatoes, said to be the world's most popular fruit, can be made both better-tasting and longer-lasting thanks to UK research with purple GM varieties. "Working with GM tomatoes that are different to normal fruit only by the addition of a specific compound, allows us to pinpoint exactly how to breed in valuable traits," said Professor Cathie Martin from the John Innes Centre. The research could also lead to GM varieties with better flavour, health and shelf life characteristics because even higher levels of the compounds can be achieved. In research to be published ...

Tempe, Ariz. — An amazing glow-in-the-dark cockroach, a harp-shaped carnivorous sponge and the smallest vertebrate on Earth are just three of the newly discovered top 10 species selected by the International Institute for Species Exploration at Arizona State University. A global committee of taxonomists — scientists responsible for species exploration and classification — announced its list of top 10 species from 2012 today, May 23. The announcement, now in its sixth year, coincides with the anniversary of the birth of Carolus Linnaeus — the 18th century Swedish botanist ...

LA JOLLA, CA---Scientists have uncovered a survival mechanism that occurs in breast cells that have just turned premalignant-cells on the cusp between normalcy and cancers-which may lead to new methods of stopping tumors. In their Molecular Cell study, the Salk Institute researchers report that a protein known as transforming growth factor beta (TGF-β), considered a tumor suppressor in early cancer development, can actually promote cancer once a cell drifts into a pre-cancerous state. The discovery-a surprise to the investigators-raises the tantalizing possibility ...

A University of British Columbia engineer and a team of U.S. researchers have made a breakthrough utilizing spray-on technology that could revolutionize the way optical lenses are made and used. Kenneth Chau, an assistant professor in the School of Engineering at UBC's Okanagan campus, is a key investigator among colleagues at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Maryland. Their work – the development of a flat lens – is published in the May 23 issue of the journal Nature. Nearly all lenses – whether in an eye, a camera, or a microscope – are presently ...

A discovery made in fish could aid research into motor neuron disease. Scientists have found that a key hormone allows young zebrafish to develop and replace their motor neurons – a kind of nerve cell found in the spinal cord. The discovery may aid efforts to create neurons from stem cells in the lab, and support further research into a disorder for which there is still no cure. In humans, motor neurons control important muscle activities such as speaking, walking and breathing. When these cells stop working, it causes difficulties in motor functions and leads ...

22 May 2013, Paris, France: The Lotus Valve, a second-generation transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) device, was successfully implanted in all of the first 60 patients in results from REPRISE II reported at EuroPCR 2013, which showed good device performance and low mortality at 30 days. "First generation TAVI devices provide significant clinical benefit, but there are opportunities for improvement," explained lead author Ian Meredith, Director of MonashHeart, Southern Health and Professor of Medicine, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia. He suggested that ...

Research teams from UW-Milwaukee and the University of York investigating the properties of ultra-thin films of new materials are helping bring quantum computing one step closer to reality. An on-going collaboration between physicists from York and the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, USA, is focusing on understanding, tailoring and tuning the electronic properties of topological insulators (TI) - new materials with surfaces that host a quantum state of matter – at the nanoscale. Understanding the properties of thin films of the new materials and integrating them with ...

Researchers at Lund University have succeeded in preventing very early symptoms of Huntington's disease, depression and anxiety, by deactivating the mutated huntingtin protein in the brains of mice. "We are the first to show that it is possible to prevent the depression symptoms of Huntington's disease by deactivating the diseased protein in nerve cell populations in the hypothalamus in the brain. This is hugely exciting and bears out our previous hypotheses", explains Åsa Petersén, Associate Professor of Neuroscience at Lund University. Huntington's is a debilitating ...

Jerusalem, May 13, 2013 – A known difficulty in fighting influenza (flu) is the ability of the flu viruses to mutate and thus evade various medications that were previously found to be effective. Researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have shown recently that another, more promising, approach is to focus on improving drugs that boost the body's natural flu killer system. Emergence of new influenza strains, such as the recent avian influenza (H5N1) and swine influenza (H1N1 2009), can lead to the emergence of severe pandemics that pose a major threat to the ...

The tight wrapping of genomic DNA around nucleosomes in the cell nucleus makes it unavailable for gene expression. A team of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich now describes a mechanism that allows chromosomal DNA to be locally displaced from nucleosomes for transcription. In higher organisms the genomic DNA is stored in the cell nucleus, wrapped around disk-shaped particles called nucleosomes, each consisting of two pairs of four different histone proteins and accommodating two loops of DNA. Packed in this way to form chromatin, the DNA is protected, but ...

Nervous about that upcoming job interview? You might want to take steps to reduce your jitters, especially if you are a man. People who are anxious perform more poorly in job interviews, and the effect is worse for men than women, according to new research from the University of Guelph. "Most job applicants experience interview anxiety prior to and during interviews," said psychology professor Deborah Powell, who conducted the study with PhD student Amanda Feiler. Anxiety often shows up as nervous tics, difficulty speaking and trouble coming up with answers, all of ...

DETROIT – A study by researchers at Henry Ford Hospital found "substantial evidence" that a regenerative process involving damaged nerve fibers in the spinal cord could hold the key to better functional recovery by most stroke victims. The findings may offer new hope to those who suffer stroke, the leading cause of long-term disability in adults. Although most stroke victims recover some ability to voluntarily use their hands and other body parts, about half are left with weakness on one side of their bodies, while a substantial number are permanently disabled. The study ...

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – As the human body fine-tunes its neurological wiring, nerve cells often must fix a faulty connection by amputating an axon — the "business end" of the neuron that sends electrical impulses to tissues or other neurons. It is a dance with death, however, because the molecular poison the neuron deploys to sever an axon could, if uncontained, kill the entire cell. Researchers from the University of North Carolina School of Medicine have uncovered some surprising insights about the process of axon amputation, or "pruning," in a study published May 21 in ...

Bochum's medics have succeeded in treating cerebral palsy with autologous cord blood. Following a cardiac arrest with severe brain damage, a 2.5 year old boy had been in a persistent vegetative state – with minimal chances of survival. Just two months after treatment with the cord blood containing stem cells, the symptoms improved significantly; over the following months, the child learned to speak simple sentences and to move. "Our findings, along with those from a Korean study, dispel the long-held doubts about the effectiveness of the new therapy", says Dr. Arne Jensen ...

The temperature in the permafrost on Ellesmere Island in the Canadian high Arctic is nearly as cold as that of the surface of Mars. So the recent discovery by a McGill University led team of scientists of a bacterium that is able to thrive at –15ºC, the coldest temperature ever reported for bacterial growth, is exciting. The bacterium offers clues about some of the necessary preconditions for microbial life on both the Saturn moon Enceladus and Mars, where similar briny subzero conditions are thought to exist. The team of researchers, led by Prof. Lyle Whyte and postdoctoral ...

Magnetars – the dense remains of dead stars that erupt sporadically with bursts of high-energy radiation – are some of the most extreme objects known in the Universe. A major campaign using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and several other satellites shows magnetars may be more diverse – and common – than previously thought. When a massive star runs out of fuel, its core collapses to form a neutron star, an ultradense object about 10 to 15 miles wide. The gravitational energy released in this process blows the outer layers away in a supernova explosion and leaves the ...

WASHINGTON – Given the implications for the overall health, development, and academic success of children, schools should play a primary role in ensuring that all students have opportunities to engage in at least 60 minutes per day of vigorous or moderate-intensity physical activity, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine. Recent estimates suggest that only about half of school-age children meet this evidence-based guideline for promoting better health and development. The report recommends that most daily physical activity occur during regular school hours ...

(WASHINGTON, May 23, 2013) – Treating pediatric leukemia patients with a liposomal formulation of anthracycline-based chemotherapy at a more intense-than-standard dose during initial treatment may result in high survival rates without causing any added heart toxicity, according to the results of a study published online today in Blood, the Journal of the American Society of Hematology (ASH). Acute myeloid leukemia (AML), the second most common form of leukemia in children, is a blood cancer in which the bone marrow makes a large number of abnormal white blood cells that ...

Family caregivers of older adults with dementia are less stressed and their moods are improved on days when dementia patients receive adult day services (ADS), according to Penn State researchers. "Caregivers who live with and care for someone with dementia can experience extraordinary amounts of stress," said Steven Zarit, professor and head, human development and family studies. "The use of adult day services appears to provide caregivers with a much-needed break that can possibly protect them from the negative health effects caused by chronic stress." The researchers ...