brain

Sam Raimi may have been listed as a screenwriter on his first nine features as a director, but he’s evidently slowed down his scripting in the last three decades, having been awarded just two writing and one story credit across his last 11. However, Michael Waldron reveals that they were more simpatico than you might think when it came to hammering out Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Ever since the 28th installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe hit theaters, we’ve been hearing about Raimi’s significant…

While immortality might forever be out of reach, a long, healthy retirement is the stuff dreams are made of.To that end, a recent study suggests that the kinds of memory problems common in old age can be reversed, and all it takes is some cerebrospinal fluid harvested from the young. In mice, at least.  If this is sounding a little familiar, you might be thinking of a similar series of studies done back in the mid-2010s, which found that older mice could be generally 'rejuvenated' with the blood of younger animals – both…

An ongoing study is testing a new kind of neuroimaging device designed to easily capture brain activity in real-time. These preliminary experiments will investigate the effects of ketamine on functional connectivity in the brain before, during and after an experience.The new technology leverages a pre-existing brain imaging technique called functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). The most common form of the technology is called continuous-wave fNIRS, but recently a more detailed and accurate iteration has been…

According to a new systematic review, non-invasive brain stimulation may improve smoking abstinence rates 3 to 6 months after quitting.Non-invasive brain stimulation (NIBS) may improve smoking abstinence rates 3 to 6 months after quitting, according to a new systematic review published in the scientific journal Addiction.NIBS has emerged as a new therapeutic option for alcohol use disorder and other substance-related and addictive disorders in recent years. Although NIBS methods have shown promising results in the…

The human brain is said to be the most complex biological structure ever to have existed. And while science doesn't fully understand the brain yet, researchers in the expanding field of neuroscience have been making progress.  Neuroscientists have made substantial inroads towards mapping the complex functions of the brain's 85 billion or so neurons and the 100 trillion connections between them. (To put this astronomical number into perspective, there are upwards of 400 billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy.)Enter…

Scientists probing the biological underpinnings of Parkinson's disease have made an important discovery, shedding new light on the demise of cells that drives neurodegeneration linked to the condition. The breakthrough helps explain why some neurons are susceptible to this form of cell death, and raises some new possibilities around how it might be prevented.One of the hallmarks of Parkinson's disease is the death of neurons that generate the neurotransmitter dopamine. With a decline in dopamine comes a deterioration in…

"Are you even listening to me?"It's a question that discouraged parents often throw at their distracted teenagers, and the truthful answer is probably, "No."It's hard to really blame them. New research on adolescent brains suggests the reaction we have to certain voices naturally shifts with time, making our mother's voice feel less valuable.  When scanning the brains of children, those 12 years and under showed an explosive neural response to their mother's voice, activating reward centers and emotion-processing centers…

A shortcut between the skull and the brain could be a possible way for the human immune system to bypass the blood-brain barrier.Researchers recently discovered a series of tiny channels in mice and human skulls, and in mice at least, these little pathways represent an unexpected source of brain immunity.  Previously, scientists assumed that the immune system connects with the brain by slipping through a kind of neurological customs gate – a barrier separating blood channels from important neural tissue.Now it seems…

Newly Discovered Neural Network Gets Visual and Motor Circuits in SyncA fruit fly walks on a small styrofoam ball fashioned into a floating 3D treadmill. The room is completely dark, and yet, an electrode recording visual neurons in the fly’s brain relays a mysterious stream of neural activity, rising and falling like a sinusoidal wave.When Eugenia Chiappe, a neuroscientist at the Champalimaud Foundation in Portugal, first saw these results, she had a hunch her team had made an exceptional discovery. They were recording…

Researchers at the Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI) here in collaboration with the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) have developed an optogenetic tool which can help understand brain disorders like Alzheimer's disease, depression and schizophrenia.In a statement, the JMI said that the tool can study molecular trafficking in neurons and has been developed by Dr Tanveer Ahmad, who did his postdoctoral training at NIH, before joining the Multidisciplinary Centre for Advanced Research and Studies (MCARS) at the varsity as an…