Neuroscience News

The study sheds new light on the link between sleep deprivation and obesity. Image credit: Sweet Briar College.

New Animal Study Pinpoints Molecular Basis of Deep Sleep

Apr 29, 2022 by News Staff

Identification of mechanisms which increase deep sleep could lead to novel treatments which promote the restorative effects of sleep. Uygun et al. show...

Odor preference rankings were collected from nine culturally and geographically diverse populations. These included the three hunter-gatherer groups, Seri from a coastal desert and Maniq and Semaq Beri from tropical rainforest, one shoreline forager, Mah Meri, from a tropical coast; one swidden-horticulturalist, Semelai, from tropical rainforest; one farmer-foraging community, Chachi, from tropical rainforest; one subsistence agriculturalist community, Imbabura Quichua, from temperate highlands; and two urban dwellers from industrial and postindustrial communities of bustling urban settings, Mexican and Thai. The data from these nine communities were then related to available data from a large dataset on odor preference collected from urban dwellers from New York City, the United States. Image credit: Arshamian et al., doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2022.02.062.

Culture Plays Minimal Role in Perception of Odor Pleasantness, Says New Study

Apr 5, 2022 by News Staff

Humans share sensory systems with a common anatomical blueprint, but individual sensory experience nevertheless varies. In olfaction, it is not known to...

Daytime napping and cognition may drive each other’s changes bidirectionally. Image credit: StockSnap.

Study Finds Bidirectional Link between Daytime Napping and Cognitive Aging

Mar 28, 2022 by News Staff

In a new cohort study, published in the journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia, participants tended to nap longer and more frequently with aging; most importantly,...

Weekend recovery sleep doesn’t prevent weight gain or reduce insulin sensitivity. Image credit: Wok & Apix.

Study: Human Brain Selectively Tunes to Unfamiliar Voices during Sleep

Jan 18, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

A team of scientists from the University of Salzburg and the University of Basel has presented sleeping volunteers with their own names and unfamiliar...

Habitual coffee intake may be a protective factor against Alzheimer’s disease; specifically, increased coffee consumption could contribute to slower cognitive decline potentially by slowing the rate of cerebral Aβ-amyloid accumulation, and in doing so, ameliorate the associated neurotoxicity from Aβ-amyloid-mediated oxidative stress and inflammatory processes. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Higher Coffee Consumption Associated with Slower Cognitive Decline

Nov 24, 2021 by News Staff

A new long-term study led by Edith Cowan University scientists further supports the hypothesis that coffee intake may be a protective factor against Alzheimer’s...

Highly variable neuron size and input-output properties across 10 mammalian species. Image credit: Beaulieu-Laroche et al., doi: 10.1038/s41586-021-04072-3.

Human Neurons are Strikingly Different from Those of Other Mammals, Study Says

Nov 11, 2021 by News Staff

Human neurons have a much smaller number of channels that control the flow of ions (such as potassium and sodium) than expected, compared to the neurons...

DeSilva et al. suggest that patterns of human brain evolution were influenced by collective intelligence, a convergent characteristic of diverse group-living animals. Image credit: Gerd Altmann.

Human Brains Decreased in Size 3,000 Years Ago, New Study Says

Oct 25, 2021 by News Staff

Human brain size nearly quadrupled in 6 million years since Homo last shared a common ancestor with chimpanzees, but human brains are thought to have decreased...

CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing can cause hundreds of unintended mutations. Image credit: Lisichik.

Is Junk DNA What Makes Human Brain Unique?

Oct 11, 2021 by News Staff

In the genome of Homo sapiens, about 98% of DNA sequences are non-coding regions that were previously disregarded as ‘junk DNA.’ In fact, junk DNA...

Several lines of study suggest that peripheral metabolism of amyloid beta (Aß) is associated with risk for Alzheimer’s disease. In blood, greater than 90% of Aß is complexed as an apolipoprotein, raising the possibility of a lipoprotein-mediated axis for Alzheimer’s disease risk. Lam et al. report that genetic modification of C57BL/6J mice engineered to synthesize human Aß only in liver has marked neurodegeneration concomitant with capillary dysfunction, parenchymal extravasation of lipoprotein-Aß, and neurovascular inflammation. Image credit: National Institute on Aging / National Institutes of Health.

Protein from Liver May Cause Alzheimer’s Disease, Groundbreaking Study Says

Sep 15, 2021 by News Staff

According to a new study in mice, a probable cause of Alzheimer’s disease is the leakage from blood into the brain of fat-carrying particles transporting...

Casiraghi et al. show that on nights before a full moon, people sleep less and go to bed later on average. Image credit: Florian Kurz.

Lunar Cycle’s Effects on Sleep are More Pronounced among Men: Study

Sep 14, 2021 by Enrico de Lazaro

A new community-dwelling study from Sweden suggests that the lunar cycle affects sleep in humans, with more pronounced sleep alterations in men than women. Sleep...

Pham et al. examined whether habitual coffee consumption is associated with differences in brain volumes or the odds of dementia or stroke. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Excessive Coffee Consumption is Associated with Smaller Brain Volumes, Increased Odds of Dementia

Jul 23, 2021 by News Staff

Coffee is a highly popular beverage worldwide, containing caffeine which is a central nervous system stimulant. In a study of 398,646 UK Biobank participants,...

Antibiotic exposure early in life could alter human brain development in areas responsible for cognitive and emotional functions. Image credit: Arek Socha.

Early-Life Penicillin Could Lead to Brain Disorders, New Study Suggests

Jul 15, 2021 by News Staff

Penicillin in early life changes microbiome and gene expression, which allows cells to respond to its changing environment, in key areas of the developing...

An area (red-yellow) in the brain’s temporal pole specializes in familiar face recognition. Image credit: Sofia Landi.

New Class of Neurons Discovered

Jul 2, 2021 by News Staff

The question of how the human brain recognizes the faces of familiar individuals has been important throughout the history of neuroscience. Cells linking...

MPS is a novel neuroprotective molecule that is more than two orders of magnitude more potent than the related molecule, ethosuximide. The discovery may enable novel treatments for human neurodegenerative diseases to be developed in the future. Image credit: National Institute on Aging / National Institutes of Health.

Chronic Psychosocial Stress Could Lead to Alzheimer’s Disease

Jun 24, 2021 by News Staff

Chronic stress, which involves a pathway called the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, may contribute to the development of Alzheimer’s disease,...

Arneodo et al. demonstrate the possibilities of a future speech prosthesis for humans. Image credit: Arneodo et al., doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2021.05.035.

Scientists Convert Songbird’s Brain Signals into Its Song

Jun 21, 2021 by News Staff

A team of researchers from the University of California, San Diego, the Universidad Nacional de La Plata and the Kavli Institute for Brain and Mind has...

$Zacharopoulos et al. examined whether the concentrations of GABA in the adolescent brain could classify whether a student is lacking mathematical education. Image credit: T.J. Evans.$