This study identifies a secreted phospholipase in the hippocampal dentate gyrus that mediates an aging-sensitive compensatory mechanism promoting cognitive resilience and neuroprotection.
Get the latest international news and world events from around the world.
Spinal ependymoma: a comprehensive review of molecular classification, management guidelines, and clinical outcomes with a focus on the pediatric population (Part III of ependymomas across compartments) — Journal of Neuro-Oncology
Spinal ependymomas are rare tumors of the central nervous system characterized by distinct anatomical, histological, and molecular subtypes. This review aims to synthesize current evidence regarding the presentation, diagnosis, surgical management, adjuvant therapy, and outcomes of spinal ependymomas, with a focus on the pediatric population.
We conducted a narrative review of contemporary literature, consensus recommendations, and relevant treatment-related molecular classifications. Key topics included preoperative evaluation, neuraxis imaging, intraoperative strategies, extent of resection, histopathologic and molecular risk stratification, adjuvant radiotherapy and chemotherapy, recurrence patterns, and long-term surveillance. Representative clinical cases illustrating the surgical management of intramedullary spinal ependymomas and myxopapillary ependymomas are provided in the supplementary material.
Spinal ependymomas encompass spinal ependymoma, spinal ependymoma with MYCN amplification, spinal subependymoma, and spinal myxopapillary ependymoma. The primary therapeutic goal is maximal safe gross total resection, which is the most consistent modifiable predictor of progression-free survival. Molecular classification enhances risk stratification, especially for the aggressive MYCN-amplified subgroup. However, histologic grade and the extent of resection remain critical to management. Adjuvant radiotherapy is generally recommended for cases involving subtotal resection, grade 3 disease, tumor dissemination, capsular violation in myxopapillary tumors, or high-risk biology. Chemotherapy does not have a well-established role as a first-line treatment. Much of this evidence is extrapolated from adult or mixed-age cohorts, however, and pediatric-specific data remain limited across nearly every management domain, a gap we characterize systematically.
Motor neurons activate unexpected defense to clear ALS-linked protein before it clumps
ALS is a disease in which, in most cases, a protein forms aggregates in neurons, leading to the rapid loss of motor control and death. A Nagoya University research team has discovered in human neuron cell cultures and mice an unexpected defense mechanism that neurons switch on to avoid these aggregates, offering a new potential path to developing a treatment.
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a neurodegenerative disorder that affects roughly 10,000 people in Japan. It is characterized by a rapid loss of control over the limbs and other body parts. Without a ventilator, patients have a life expectancy of two to five years after onset.
In most cases, a specific protein is at the root of the problem: TDP-43 is usually in the neuron’s nucleus and has various roles in maintaining the cell’s health and function. However, in people with ALS, it aggregates in the cells’ cytoplasm.
Helping others linked to younger-looking adult brains, even after accounting for health and lifestyle
Population surveys and research studies suggest that meaningful social connections are strong predictors of health and longevity. In other words, a sense of belonging to a social group and strong social bonds appear to be linked with better health and a longer lifespan.
Most earlier studies, however, primarily focused on the possible health-related benefits of receiving social support or interacting with others regularly. In contrast, the potential benefits of supporting and helping others remain largely unexplored.
Researchers at Georgetown University, Emory University and the University of Wisconsin–Madison recently carried out a study investigating the possibility that time spent supporting others is associated with brain health. Their findings, published in Translational Psychiatry, suggest that the brains of people who report spending more time supporting others appear younger (relative to their actual age) than those of people who report spending less time helping others.
The Function of Consciousness | Alexander Klein
We welcome Alexander Klein to examine the role of consciousness in behavior. Drawing on William James’s evolutionary theory and nineteenth-century experiments on frogs, Klein considers whether consciousness is essential to purposeful action or merely accompanies it. The conversation questions how we identify consciousness in animals and AI, and whether its evolutionary function can account for the subjective richness of experience.
Chapters:
00:00 Introduction.
00:11 The Brainless Frog Experiment.
09:06 Access and Phenomenal Consciousness.
12:11 Consciousness in AI
17:03 Philosophical Zombies.
20:21 Is Consciousness Universal?
24:14 The Evolution of Consciousness.
37:14 William James’s Functional Theory.
42:18 Qualia and Subjective Experience.
55:39 Conclusion.
Presenters: Mark Oppenheimer and Jason Werbeloff.
Editor and Producer: Jimmy Mullen and Porter Kaufman.
Brain in a Vat bookshop (Shopify): https://smarturl.it/BrainShop.
Brain in a Vat bookshop (Amazon): https://smarturl.it/BrainAmazonShop.
Podcast: https://anchor.fm/braininavat.
Contact us: Mark. Oppenheimer[at]gmail and Jwerbe[at]gmail.
Our Extropian Future, with Max More
Our Extropian Future: Max More on AI Timelines, Life Extension, Cryonics, and the Birth of Transhumanism.
Is the AI revolution moving fast enough to save us from aging? Or are we repeating the same over-optimistic mistakes of the past? In this deep and personal conversation, Giulio Prisco sits down with Max More, a philosopher, futurist, and founding figure of the Extropian movement, to revisit the ideas that shaped modern transhumanism and assess where we stand today.
Key moments you don’t want to miss!
0:00 — The Urgency of Life Extension.
1:51 — From Extropian Mailing List to Transhumanist Pioneer.
3:49 — The AI Revolution: Renewed Optimism vs. Cautious Realism.
5:04 — Max’s View: Why Transformers/LLMs Won’t Lead to Superintelligence.
9:49 — The IT Productivity Paradox: Why Exponential Curves Don’t Last.
12:09 — The Genome Project Lesson.
17:28 — Extropian Discussions: Did They Predict Today’s AI?
20:03 — The AI Debate: Doomers, Accelerationists, and Progressives.
24:50 — The Existential Risk We All Face: The Need to Accelerate.
30:26 — The Birth of Extropy.
34:44 — Fukuyama’s \
Could we connect our brains to a quantum computer? 🧠💻
In our latest video we explore quantum consciousness, for decades, the idea has been dismissed as too strange to take seriously. But experiments involving mi…
Scientists discover a trigger for cancer cells’ self-destruction
Researchers have found that when cancer cells are compressed or tightly confined, they begin a process that results in their self destruction.
Experts at Fudan University, Sun Yat-sen University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shanghai used three dimensional models to uncover how cancer cells responded when mechanically confined for prolonged periods of time.
They saw that the cells, when trapped in tight spaces, underwent a kind of chronic stress response that affected their metastatic behavior — which enables them to spread — and resulted in cell death.
