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Category: neuroscience – Page 28

The Wetware Spectrum: How the Brain Runs on Analog Waves, Digital Spikes, and Probabilistic Dreams

There is a habit of mind so embedded in Western intellectual history that we barely notice it anymore: when we want to understand the brain, we reach for the most sophisticated machine available and say, in effect, the brain is something like that. This is not merely a rhetorical convenience. It is a cognitive strategy — perhaps the only one available to us — for peering into an organ that cannot be fully observed from the inside, from the outside, or from anywhere in between. The machine metaphor is the mind’s mirror, and like all mirrors, it tells us something true and something distorted at the same time.

Ten‐year cognitive outcomes following epilepsy surgery: Temporal lobectomy versus selective amygdalohippocampectomy

Objective This study aimed to assess long-term memory outcomes in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) who underwent anterior temporal lobectomy (ATL) or selective amygdalohippocampectomy (SAH), compared to nonoperated TLE over a 10-year follow-up period.

Obstructive sleep apnea in people with epilepsy: Modifying risk

Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a common but underdiagnosed and undertreated sleep disorder among people with epilepsy (PWE). In PWE, this sleep disorder is often managed as a comorbid condition rather than a contributor to epilepsy outcomes. For many years, OSA has been associated with higher seizure burden and interictal epileptiform discharges. Emerging evidence links OSA to late onset epilepsy (LOE) and increased risk markers for sudden unexpected death in epilepsy (SUDEP). This evidence also suggests that treating OSA with continuous positive airway pressure may improve seizure control. This critical review of the literature posits that OSA should be viewed as a modifiable risk factor for PWE. We apply the Bradford Hill criteria for causation as a framework to appraise the evidence connecting OSA with seizure severity, incident LOE, and SUDEP risk.

Personalized gene therapy helps teen with rare form of severe epilepsy walk independently

SCN2A-related developmental epileptic encephalopathy (DEE) is a rare, severe form of childhood epilepsy and one of the most common causes of monogenic autism. The condition is caused by single mutations in the sodium voltage-gated channel alpha subunit (SCN2A) gene, which controls the flow of sodium ions into neurons. These mutations promote abnormal brain excitability, resulting in uncontrolled seizures along with developmental delays, autism, movement problems and gastrointestinal issues. Most of these mutations are de novo (not inherited from a parent) and arise spontaneously.

Traditional antiseizure medications are often ineffective and do not address the underlying genetic cause of SCN2A-related DEE.

Now, an international team of researchers led by the University of California San Diego and Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine has treated two children with the condition using gene therapy tailored to each child’s specific SCN2A mutation.

Scientists Link Heavy TV Watching to Brain Changes Decades Later

Heavy television viewing in middle age was linked to a troubling brain signature more than 20 years later.

Television may be doing more than filling quiet hours. A long-term study suggests that people who watched it most frequently in middle age later showed structural brain differences linked to memory loss, vascular damage, and dementia.

The findings, published in Alzheimer’s and Dementia: Journal of the Alzheimer’s Association, challenge the idea that all sitting affects the brain in the same way. Time spent watching television was associated with poorer brain health decades later, while sitting at work showed a very different pattern.

Ancient Proteomics Reveals How Brains Survive for Millennia

In a new study, researchers tracked over 1.2 million peptide trajectories to map out this preservation pathway. The results revealed that low-oxygen environments combined with specific protein structures turned destructive decay into a mechanism for long-term molecular stability.

The paradox of brain preservation

Brain tissue naturally breaks down very quickly once the body dies. Even so, thousands of ancient brains have miraculously survived for millennia, creating an unusual contradiction for tissue preservation researchers.

One Common Vitamin Could Lower Toxic Alzheimer’s Proteins, Research Suggests

The benefits of vitamin D are many, with research suggesting it plays an important role in several facets of our health, from boosting our immunity to helping us counter harmful diseases.

As long as we don’t have too much of it, vitamin D is an essential part of a healthy body. But there’s still a lot we don’t know about just how far its goodness extends.

In recent years, numerous studies have demonstrated that low levels of vitamin D in older adults are associated with increased risk of cognitive impairment and clinical dementia.

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