Tag: brain

Can brain injury from boxing, MMA be measured?

For boxers and mixed martial arts (MMA) fighters, is there a safe level of exposure to head trauma? A new study shows different effects in the brain for younger, current fighters compared to older, retired fighters. The study is published in the December 23, 2019, online issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American

Using machine learning tools to reveal how memories are coded in the brain

Researchers working in The N.1 Institute for Health at NUS, led by Assistant Professor Camilo Libedinsky from NUS Psychology, and Senior Lecturer Shih-Cheng Yen from the Innovation and Design Programme at NUS Engineering, have discovered that a population of neurons in the brain’s frontal lobe contain stable short-term memory information within dynamically-changing neural activity. This

Scientists develop a new method to detect light in the brain

Researchers from Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT) and University of Salento, both in Lecce, Italy, and Harvard Medical School in Boston have developed a new light-based method to capture and pinpoint the epicenter of neural activity in the brain. The approach, described in Nature Methods, lays the foundation for novel ways to map connections across

Smokers and hypertensive individuals have higher risk of sudden death from brain bleed than previously believed

Contrary to the previous data, a Finnish study clarifies that smoking and high blood pressure do not protect from death in patients suffering from subarachnoid hemorrhage, the most lethal stroke subtype. In fact, subarachnoid hemorrhage kills smokers and hypertensive individuals even before they reach hospitals, and therefore, previous studies that did not include these deaths

Researchers study social communication in pediatric traumatic brain injury

Kessler Foundation researchers conducted a pilot study to determine ways to assess social communication difficulties in children with impaired social functioning caused by moderate-to-severe traumatic brain injury (TBI). The article, “The relationship between social communication and social functioning in pediatric TBI: A pilot study” was epublished on August 14, 2019 by Frontiers in Neurology. The

Brain studies show chronic fatigue syndrome and Gulf War illness are distinct conditions

Gulf War Illness (GWI) and chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) share symptoms of disabling fatigue, pain, systemic hyperalgesia (tenderness), negative emotion, sleep and cognitive dysfunction that are made worse after mild exertion (postexertional malaise). Now, neuroscientists at Georgetown University Medical Center have evidence, derived from human brain studies, that GWI and CFS are two distinct disorders

How meaning is represented in the human brain

Representations reflecting non-linguistic experience have been detected in brain activity during reading in study of healthy, native English speakers published in JNeurosci. The research brings us one step closer to a more complete characterization of human language. Words and their relationship to one’s experience are thought to be combined in the brain to enable understanding

Brain implant restores visual perception to the blind

Seven years ago, Jason Esterhuizen was in a horrific car crash that destroyed his eyes, plunging him into total darkness. Today, he’s regained visual perception and more independence, thanks to an experimental device implanted in his brain by researchers at UCLA Health. “Now I can do things that I couldn’t do before,” said Esterhuizen, 30,

Slowing brain rhythms can serve as a marker for delirium and its clinical outcomes

An EEG (electroencephalogram) can provide a valuable biomarker for detecting delirium, a serious mental disturbance that is often underrecognized, as well as predicting poor clinical outcomes, researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) have found. In a paper published in Neurology, the team reported that the generalized slowing of brain rhythms, shown as abnormal theta or

The birth of vision from the retina to the brain

How is the retina formed? And how do neurons differentiate to become individual components of the visual system? By focusing on the early stages of this complex process, researchers at the University of Geneva (UNIGE), Switzerland, in collaboration with the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), have identified the genetic programs governing the birth of

White matter affects how people respond to brain stimulation therapy aimed at depression and stroke

White matter affects how people respond to brain stimulation therapy aimed at depression and stroke Tiny changes in the microscopic structure of the human brain may affect how patients respond to an emerging therapy for neurological problems. The technique, called non-invasive electrical brain stimulation, involves applying an electrical current to the surface of a patient’s