Researchers have developed a new CRISPR-based technology that transports RNA to exact locations within neurons, where it can trigger repair and regrowth—offering hope for treating neurological diseases and injuries.
Category: neuroscience – Page 32
Gene variant linked to higher risk of long COVID symptoms
An international team of researchers has found a genetic link to long-term symptoms after COVID-19. The identified gene variant is located close to the FOXP4 gene, which is known to affect lung function. The study, published in Nature Genetics, was led by researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden and the Institute for Molecular Medicine in Finland.
Biological causes behind persistent symptoms after COVID-19 infection, known as long COVID or post-COVID, remain unclear. Common symptoms include fatigue, cognitive difficulties, and breathing problems, which can reduce quality of life.
In an international collaboration —the Long COVID Host Genetics Initiative—researchers have analyzed genetic data from 6,450 long COVID patients and more than a million controls across 24 studies from 16 countries.
‘Groovy’ brains may be more efficient
Many grooves and dimples on the surface of the brain are unique to humans, but they’re often dismissed as an uninteresting consequence of packing an unusually large brain into a too-small skull.
But neuroscientists are finding that these folds are not mere artifacts, like the puffy folds you get when forcing a sleeping bag into a stuff sack. The depths of some of the smallest of these grooves seem to be linked to increased interconnectedness in the brain and better reasoning ability.
In a study published in The Journal of Neuroscience, University of California, Berkeley researchers show that in children and adolescents, the depths of some small grooves are correlated with increased connectivity between regions of the brain—the lateral prefrontal cortex and lateral parietal cortex—involved in reasoning and other high-level cognitive functions.
Sitting Could Be Shrinking Your Brain (And Exercise May Not Help)
Sitting might be a comfortable and convenient way to spend much of your day, but a new study of older adults suggests it can lead to brain shrinkage and cognitive issues, irrespective of how much exercise you’re managing to fit in.
The research counters the idea that periods of sitting can be balanced out by periods of being active, at least when it comes to brain health in people aged 50 or above.
The study researchers, from Vanderbilt University, the University of Pittsburgh, and Seoul National University, think that too much sitting or lying down (known as sedentary behavior) can impact the brain and increase the risk of different types of dementia later in life, including Alzheimer’s disease.
Researchers develop a new set of genetic tools designed to treat brain diseases
Scientists say they’ve put together a new kind of molecular toolkit that could eventually be used to treat a variety of brain diseases, possibly including epilepsy, sleep disorders and Huntington’s disease.
The kit currently contains more than 1,000 tools of a type known as enhancer AAV vectors, with AAV standing for “adeno-associated virus.” A consortium that included researchers from Seattle’s Allen Institute for Brain Science and the University of Washington combined harmless adeno-associated viruses with snippets of engineered DNA to create a gene-therapy package that could target specific neurons in the brain while having no effect on other cells.
Researchers laid out their findings in a set of eight studies published today in the Cell Press family of journals. The work is part of a project called the Armamentarium for Precision Brain Cell Access, funded through the National Institutes of Health’s BRAIN Initiative.
