A new study led by Stanford Medicine scientists found that certain changes in neural activity predicted which patients would benefit from a type of cognitive behavioral therapy.
Category: neuroscience – Page 144
It includes all ~50 million connections between nearly 140,000 neurons in the brain of a fruit fly.
Unlocking the complexities of the fruit fly brain is a crucial step toward understanding the human brain. Fruit flies share many genetic similarities with humans, making them a valuable model organism for studying brain functions as well as diseases.
“An estimated 75% of human genes related to diseases have homologs in the fly genome,” Sebastian Seung, co-leader of the research team, told Interesting Engineering (IE).
“We’ve long known about the molecular similarities between fly and human brains. We have been slower to realize that there are also similarities at the circuit level, revealed by examining patterns of connectivity. We now know that fly circuits for olfaction, vision, and navigation have architectural similarities with mammalian circuits for the same functions,” Seung added.
The team says that DNA — known for its stability and density — could be an ideal candidate for MRI data storage.
Brain MRI scans provide invaluable insights into our bodies.
Interestingly, the team successfully encoded 11.28 megabytes of brain MRI data into roughly 250,000 DNA sequences. This translates to a data density of 2.39 bits per base.
The encoded oligos, which are the DNA sequences containing the MRI data, are stored in a “dry powder form.” The oligos weigh only 3 micrograms, which is incredibly small. This suggests that a vast amount of data can be stored in a tiny space.
It can “support over 300 reads under current technical standards.”
The same technique could also be applied to studies of brain damage, Ruetz said. “Neural stem cells in the subventricular zone are also in the business of repairing brain tissue damage from stroke or traumatic brain injury.”
The glucose transporter connection “is a hopeful finding,” Brunet said. For one, it suggests not only the possibility of designing pharmaceutical or genetic therapies to turn on new neuron growth in old or injured brains, but also the possibility of developing simpler behavioral interventions, such as a low carbohydrate diet that might adjust the amount of glucose taken up by old neural stem cells.
The researchers found other provocative pathways worthy of follow-up studies. Genes relating to primary cilia, parts of some brain cells that play a critical role in sensing and processing signals such as growth factors and neurotransmitters, also are associated with neural stem cell activation. This finding reassured the team that their methodology was effective, partly because unrelated previous work had already discovered associations between cilia organization and neural stem cell function. It is also exciting because the association with the new leads about glucose transmission could point toward alternative avenues of treatment that might engage both pathways, Brunet said.
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Put simply, the brain is not too warm or wet for consciousness to exist as a wave that connects with the universe.
For decades, Penrose has been working with anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff on a theory of consciousness called Orchestrated Objective Reduction (Orch OR). Penrose primarily handles the physics of Orch OR, whereas Hameroff handles the biology. Their theory addressed serious gaps in established scientific frameworks spanning physics, neuroscience and psychology. All, some or none of the hypotheses in this theory might prove out experimentally. See the paper below as a step towards proof.
Researchers from the Color and Food Quality group at the Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Seville, in partnership with Dr. Marina Ezcurra’s team at the University of Kent (UK), have demonstrated that the carotenoid phytoene extends the lifespan of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Additionally, it delays the onset of paralysis linked to amyloid plaque formation in an Alzheimer’s disease model.
Specifically, increases in longevity of between 10 and 18.6% and decreases in the proteotoxic effect of plaques of between 30 and 40% were observed. The studies, which form part of Ángeles Morón Ortiz’s doctoral thesis, tested pure phytoene and extracts rich in this carotenoid obtained from microalgae.
According to Dr. Paula Mapelli Brahm, “These are very exciting preliminary results, so we are looking for funding to continue this line of research and to find out by what mechanisms these effects are produced.”
In neuroscience and biomedical engineering, accurately modeling the complex movements of the human hand has long been a significant challenge.
The procedure is the world’s first human application of a graphene-based brain-computer interface.
A new brain-mapping tool just dropped!
LA JOLLA—Scientists at the Salk Institute are unveiling a new brain-mapping neurotechnology called Single Transcriptome Assisted Rabies Tracing (START). The cutting-edge tool combines two advanced technologies—monosynaptic rabies virus tracing and single-cell transcriptomics—to map the brain’s intricate neuronal connections with unparalleled precision.
Using the technique, the researchers became the first to identify the patterns of connectivity made by transcriptomic subtypes of inhibitory neurons in the cerebral cortex. They say having this ability to map the connectivity of neuronal subtypes will drive the development of novel therapeutics that can target certain neurons and circuits with greater specificity. Such treatments could be more effective and produce fewer side effects than current pharmacological approaches.
The study, published on September 30, 2024, in Neuron, is the first to resolve cortical connectivity at the resolution of transcriptomic cell types.