‘Neuroscience’ Neuroscience Articles
Attention and Awareness Uncoupled
Brain imaging experiments uncouple two apparently intimately connected mental processes In everyday life, attention and awareness appear tightly interwoven. Attending to the scissors on the right side of your desk, you become aware of their attributes, for example the red [Read More]
Parkinsonian Worms May Hold the Key to Identifying Drugs for Parkinson’s Disease
Researchers at The University of Texas at Austin have devised a simple test, using dopamine-deficient worms, for identifying drugs that may help people with Parkinson’s disease. The worms are able to evaluate as many as 1,000 potential drugs a year. The researchers [Read More]
HC: Woman with Amnesia Unable to Hold a Single Face in Short-term Memory … Unless it’s Paris Hilton
Study shows intact memory for familiar information, despite memory deficit A 22-year-old woman known as “HC” with amnesia since birth as a result of developing only half the normal volume of the hippocampus in her brain, has demonstrated to scientists that the [Read More]
Brain Parasite Directly Alters Brain Chemistry – T gondii Affects Dopamine
A research group from the University of Leeds has shown that infection by the brain parasite Toxoplasma gondii, found in 10-20 per cent of the UK’s population, directly affects the production of dopamine, a key chemical messenger in the brain. Their findings are the [Read More]
The Battle of the Morphogens: How to Get Ahead in the Nervous System
Salk scientists discover a highly conserved mechanism governing brain development. If you think today’s political rhetoric is overheated, imagine what goes on inside a vertebrate embryo. There, two armies whose agendas are poles apart, engage in a battle with [Read More]
Word Association: Princeton Study Matches Brain Scans with Complex Thought
In an effort to understand what happens in the brain when a person reads or considers such abstract ideas as love or justice, Princeton researchers have for the first time matched images of brain activity with categories of words related to the concepts a person is thinking [Read More]
A New Nuance to Neurons
A fundamental new discovery about how nerve cells in the brain store and release tiny sacs filled with chemicals may radically alter the way scientists think about neurotransmission – the electrical signaling in the brain that enables everything from the way we move, to [Read More]
Ready to learn? Brain Scans Can Tell You
Neuroscientists identify brain activity that predicts how well you will remember images. Our memories work better when our brains are prepared to absorb new information, according to a new study by MIT researchers. A team led by Professor John Gabrieli has shown that [Read More]
Neuroscientists Show Activity Patterns in Fly Brain are Optimized for Memory Storage
We know from experience that particular smells are almost inseparable in our minds with memories, some vague and others very specific. The smell of just-baked bread may trigger an involuntary mental journey, even if for a moment, to childhood, or to a particular day during [Read More]
Study Finds Enzyme Disrupting Nerve Cell Communication in Alzheimer’s Disease
A modified form of the enzyme Cdk5 is elevated in the brains of Alzheimer’s disease patients, where it triggers damage to nerve cell connections. Alzheimer’s disease is characterized by abnormal proteins that stick together in little globs, disrupting cognitive function [Read More]
