UCL researchers have developed an innovative way to understand how the brain works by using flashes of light, allowing them to both 'read' and 'write' brain signals.
When human brain cells called astrocytes are let loose in mouse brains, they rapidly overwhelm the mouse cells and make the rodents smarter.
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However, the team decided not to try putting human cells into monkeys. "We briefly considered it but decided not to because of all the potential ethical issues," Goldman says.
Enard agrees that it could be difficult to decide which animals to put human brain cells into. "If you make animals more human-like, where do you stop?" he says.
tuckfheman reblogged
Neuroscientists prescribe video games for people with autism and Asperger’s so they can practice social interaction in a safe, non-threatening environment. This eases anxiety and allows users to gain confidence and apply it in their daily lives. Source
Source: didyouknowblog.com
Scientists at the Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine (LCSB) of the University of Luxembourg have grafted neurons reprogrammed from skin cells into the brains of mice for the first time with long-term stability.
Researchers in the field of neuroscience have thought long and hard about the mystery of how our brains process emotions, but it took a team of researchers at Cornell University to finally solve the puzzle. It turns out the answer lies in viewing finely grained patterns of brain activity as a neural code that records people’s subjective feelings.
An international group led by Vanderbilt University researchers has found cannabinoid receptors, through which marijuana exerts its effects, in a key emotional hub in the brain involved in regulating anxiety and the flight-or-fight response. This is the first time cannabinoid receptors have been identified in the central nucleus of the amygdala in a mouse model, they report in the current issue of the journal Neuron. The discovery may help explain why marijuana users say they take the drug mainly to reduce anxiety, said Sachin Patel, M.D., Ph.D., the paper’s senior author and professor of Psychiatry and of Molecular Physiology and Biophysics.
We’re told studies have proven that drugs like heroin and cocaine instantly hook a user. But it isn’t that simple – little-known experiments over 30 years ago tell a very different tale. ... But there is more to the real scientific story, even if it isn’t widely talked about. The results of a set of little-known experiments carried out more than 30 years ago paint a very different picture, and illustrate how easy it is for neuroscience to be twisted to pander to popular anxieties. ...
The results are catastrophic for the simplistic idea that one use of a drug inevitably hooks the user by rewiring their brain.
When Alexander’s rats were given something better to do than sit in a bare cage they turned their noses up at morphine because they preferred playing with their friends and exploring their surroundings to getting high.
Related : Psychopharmacology Volume 58 issue 2 1978 http://ge.tt/6cJGy7s/v/0
Related : A Liberal Account of Addiction http://ge.tt/5xPqy7s/v/0
UC Berkeley scientists have developed a system to capture visual activity in my brain and reconstruct it as digital video clips.
Eventually, this process will allow you to record and reconstruct your own dreams on a computer screen.
More here
Frontiers | On the nature of extraversion: variation in conditioned contextual activation of dopamine-facilitated affective, cognitive, and motor processes | Frontiers in Human Neuroscience publishes articles on the most outstanding discoveries across the research spectrum of Frontiers | On the nature of extraversion: variation in conditioned contextual activation of dopamine-facilitated affective, cognitive, and motor processes | Human Neuroscience.
Brain Frontal Lobes Not Sole Center of Human Intelligence, Comparative Research Suggests
May 13, 2013 — Human intelligence cannot be explained by the size of the brain's frontal lobes, say researchers.
Research into the comparative size of the frontal lobes in humans and other species has determined that they are not -- as previously thought -- disproportionately enlarged relative to other areas of the brain, according to the most accurate and conclusive study of this area of the brain.
Source: sciencedaily.com
They once were blind but now they see. Which begs the question — what exactly do people see when they gain sight for the first time? Often, it's terrifying.
Scientists Reverse Memory Loss in Animal Brain Cells
Neuroscientists at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) have taken a major step in their efforts to help people with memory loss tied to brain disorders such as Alzheimer's disease.
Using sea snail nerve cells, the scientists reversed memory loss by determining when the cells were primed for learning. The scientists were able to help the cells compensate for memory loss by retraining them through the use of optimized training schedules. Findings of this proof-of-principle study appear in the April 17 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience.
Source: sciencedaily.com
Perceptual Object and Action Maps in the Human Brain
Alex Huth, first author of our new paper, talks about how visual information about thousands of objects and actions are represented across human visual cortex. For more information, please visit our web site (gallantlab.org) or get the paper: Huth, A.G., S. Nishimoto, A.T. Vu & J.L. Gallant (2012). A continuous semantic space describes representation of thousands of object and action categories across the human brain. Neuron, December 20 2012. For more information about this paper or our other work please visit our lab web page: http://gallantlab.org
Chris Eliasmith has spent years contemplating how to build a brain.
He is about to publish a book with instructions, which describes the grey matter's architecture and how the different components interact.
"Then I thought the only way people are going to believe me is if I demonstrate it," says the University of Waterloo neuroscientist.
So Eliasmith's team built Spaun, which was billed Thursday as "the world's largest simulation of a functioning brain."
Spaun can recognize numbers, remember lists and write them down. It even passes some basic aspects of an IQ test, the team reports in the journal Science.
Several labs are working on large models of the brain- including the multi-million-dollar Blue Brain Project in Europe - but these can't see, remember or control limbs, says Eliasmith.
"Right now very large-scale models of the brain don't do anything," he said in an interview.
Source: canada.com
Mind-machine researchers get leg up from cockroach
Nov. 19 - The ability to control machines with the human mind is being put to the test in Santiago, Chile, where researchers are developing technology aimed at transforming the lives of disabled people. The lowly cockroach has been recruited for the experiments to show how a single thought can control a detached object. Tara Cleary reports.