Researchers have discovered one of the oldest and best-preserved brains in the fossil record. A 310-million-year-old horseshoe crab was found with its complete brain intact, thanks to a previously unknown preservation method.

The majority of our knowledge of ancient creatures comes from bones – soft tissues don’t fossilize very well. Some mechanisms are better than others at preserving these fragile tissues though, most famously amber. Scientists can then scan amber-encased creatures to image their brains and other organs.

But that record only goes back so far. The oldest amber inclusions date back about 230 million years ago, to the Triassic period. Burgess Shale-type deposits, however, extend as far back as 520 million years ago, to the early Cambrian. These mudstone deposits can also preserve soft tissues as carbon films – most commonly the gut, but on rare occasions imprints of parts of the nervous system can be found.

As a cardiac electrophysiologist, Deeptankar DeMazumder has worked for years with people at risk for sudden cardiac arrest (SCA). Despite the latest medical advances, less than 10 percent of individuals stricken with an SCA will survive this highly dangerous condition in which irregular heart rhythms, or arrhythmias, cause the heart suddenly to stop beating.

In his role as a physician, DeMazumder keeps a tight focus on the electrical activity in their hearts, doing his best to prevent this potentially fatal event. In his other role, as a scientist at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, DeMazumber is also driven by a life-saving aspiration: finding ways to identify at-risk individuals with much greater accuracy than currently possible—and to develop better ways of protecting them from SCAs. He recently received a 2020 NIH Director’s New Innovator Award to pursue one of his promising ideas.

SCAs happen without warning and can cause death within minutes. Poor heart function and abnormal heart rhythms are important risk factors, but it’s not possible today to predict reliably who will have an SCA. However, doctors already routinely capture a wealth of information in electrical signals from the heart using electrocardiograms (ECGs). They also frequently use electroencephalograms (EEGs) to capture electrical activity in the brain.

Summary: Researchers believe they have found a cause of memory loss in epilepsy patients by recording single neurons in the brain.

Source: Cedars Sinai.

The discovery could offer a way to measure the effectiveness of memory-restoring therapies including medications and deep-brain stimulation. It also could be a step toward recovering lost memory among patients with a variety of brain conditions.

Summary: An experimental small molecule helped restore the removal of mitochondria from dopamine-producing neurons in the brain. The findings may help in the development of new therapies for Parkinson’s disease.

Source: Life.

Treating mice that have a Parkinson’s disease-causing mutation with a small molecule compound restores the removal of damaged mitochondria from their brain cells, shows a study published today in eLife.

Summary: A new hydrogel that acts as a gateway to transfer stem cells into the brain and facilitate repair to damaged tissue may effectively treat neurological conditions like Parkinson’s disease and stroke.

Source: Australian National University

Researchers from The Australian National University (ANU), in collaboration with The Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, have developed a new type of hydrogel that could radically transform how we treat Parkinson’s disease.

The gel also offers hope for patients who have suffered from other neurological conditions such as strokes.