Neuroscience news

Turn On, Tune In, Develop? Researchers Examine How Brain Benefits From Musical Training

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Nov 06, 2009 | 5 / 5 (5) | 4

For most people music is an enjoyable, although momentary, form of entertainment. But for those who seriously practiced a musical instrument when they were young, perhaps when they played in a school orchestra ...

Babies' language learning starts from the womb

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Nov 05, 2009 | 4 / 5 (4) | 0

(PhysOrg.com) -- From their very first days, newborns' cries already bear the mark of the language their parents speak, reveals a new study published online on November 5th in Current Biology, a Cell Press ...

Early scents really do get 'etched' in the brain

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Nov 05, 2009 | 3 / 5 (2) | 0

Common experience tells us that particular scents of childhood can leave quite an impression, for better or for worse. Now, researchers reporting the results of a brain imaging study online on November 5th ...

Brain maps help guide you through large-scale space, researchers find

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Nov 03, 2009 | 5 / 5 (3) | 0

Lost? Not sure how to get home? Trying to find your way through the mall or an airport? Help is on the way, thanks to a stack of cells, or neurons, in your head. They're mostly on the left side of the brain in males, on the ...

Study reveals second pathway to feeling your heartbeat

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Nov 02, 2009 | 4.8 / 5 (5) | 0

A new study suggests that the inner sense of our cardiovascular state, our "interoceptive awareness" of the heart pounding, relies on two independent pathways, contrary to what had been asserted by prominent researchers.

Sights and sounds of emotion trigger big brain responses

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Nov 02, 2009 | not rated yet | 0

Researchers at the University of York have identified a part of the brain that responds to both facial and vocal expressions of emotion.

Precuneus region of human and monkey brain is divided into 4 distinct regions

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Nov 02, 2009 | 4 / 5 (1) | 0

A study published this week in PNAS provides a comprehensive comparative functional anatomy study in human and monkey brains which reveals highly similar brain networks preserved across evolution.

Clinical tests begin on medication to correct Fragile X defect

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Nov 02, 2009 | 4.5 / 5 (2) | 0

NIH-supported scientists at Seaside Therapeutics in Cambridge, Mass., are beginning a clinical trial of a potential medication designed to correct a central neurochemical defect underlying Fragile X syndrome, the most common ...

This is your brain on fatty acids

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 30, 2009 | 4.8 / 5 (6) | 1

Saturated fats have a deservedly bad reputation, but Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered that a sticky lipid occurring naturally at high levels in the brain may help us memorize grandma's recipe for cinnamon buns, as ...

Researchers show efficacy of gene therapy in mouse models of Huntington's disease

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 30, 2009 | 5 / 5 (2) | 0

Researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have shown that a highly specific intrabody (an antibody fragment that works against a target inside a cell) is capable of stalling the development of Huntington's ...

Widely used cholesterol-lowering drug may prevent progression

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 29, 2009 | 5 / 5 (2) | 0

Simvastatin, a commonly used, cholesterol-lowering drug, may prevent Parkinson's disease from progressing further. Neurological researchers at Rush University Medical Center conducted a study examining the use of the FDA-approved ...

Seeing is relieving: New hope for chronic pain sufferers

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 29, 2009 | not rated yet | 0

An f1000 evaluation examines how pain relief improves greatly when the sufferer can actually see the area where the pain is occurring.

Phantom limbs learn impossible tricks

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 28, 2009 | 4.7 / 5 (6) | 4

(PhysOrg.com) -- New research has shown that body images can be formed independently of external sensory inputs, and that the phantom limbs of amputees can be trained to carry out tasks that would be impossible ...

Regeneration can be achieved after chronic spinal cord injury

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 28, 2009 | 5 / 5 (6) | 4

Scientists at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine report that regeneration of central nervous system axons can be achieved in rats even when treatment delayed is more than a year after the original ...

Bad driving may have genetic basis, study finds

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 28, 2009 | 3 / 5 (4) | 1

Bad drivers may in part have their genes to blame, suggests a new study by UC Irvine neuroscientists.

Deep brain stimulation may be effective treatment for Tourette's syndrome

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 27, 2009 | 4 / 5 (1) | 1

Deep brain stimulation may be a safe and effective treatment for Tourette syndrome, according to research published in the October 27, 2009, print issue of Neurology.

New 'schizophrenia gene' prompts researchers to test potential drug target

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 27, 2009 | not rated yet | 0

Johns Hopkins scientists report having used a commercially available drug to successfully "rescue" animal brain cells that they had intentionally damaged by manipulating a newly discovered gene that links susceptibility genes ...

No such thing as a break in a curveball?

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

Oct 27, 2009 | 4.3 / 5 (3) | 3

The answer to the question of whose curveball breaks harder -- that of the Yankees' A.J. Burnett or the Phillies' Cole Hamels -- may be neither.