Study of psychosis risk and brain to track effects of Omega-3 pills

The study will use a specific combination of omega-3 fatty acids in its supplements, unlike over-the-counter fish oil pills, which are unregulated.

By Carol Clark: The first major study on the biological effects of omega-3 fatty acids on the human brain is focusing on the role that this natural substance, primarily found in fish oil, may play in fighting psychosis. Emory University recently launched the first phase of the double-blind, clinical trial of a specific combination of omega-3 fatty acid supplements, which will ultimately involve about 160 participants, and researchers from eight universities. “This will be the first study to conduct an extensive assessment of changes in the brain associated with omega-3 fatty acids,” says lead investigator Elaine Walker, professor of psychology and neuroscience at Emory. “We are most interested in the question of how to potentially prevent the onset of psychosis.” Non-invasive techniques will be used to record both the density of different regions of the brain, and the robustness of neural connectivity, to compare the effects of a placebo and omega-3 fatty acids on teens and young adults who may be at risk for psychosis. Omega-3 fatty acids cannot be made by the human body, but are necessary for normal metabolism. Common sources include fish oils, algae and flaxseed oil. The omega-3 study, expected to last at least a year, is part of a larger, comprehensive, project to investigate the origins and prevention of psychosis, headed by Walker at Emory and funded by a grant from the National Institutes of Mental Health (NIMH).  Watch a 2010 video, below, of Elaine Walker explaining the facts, and myths, of schizophrenia:about   Schizophrenia, the most extreme psychosis, affects 1 percent  of the population. The typical onset of schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders is about 21 years of age, with warning signs beginning, on average, around age 17. Studies have shown that about 30 to 40 percent of teenagers showing warning signs will develop schizophrenia or another psychotic disorder. Another 25 percent of these at-risk teens continue to experience mild symptoms without getting worse, while the remaining 35 percent get better as they enter adulthood. While anti-psychotic drugs can be effective, they also have side effects, so physicians are hesitant to recommend them until someone enters the clinical stages of the illness. The causes of psychosis are unclear, but one of the dominant theories is that changes in the brain adversely affect the connections among neurons as psychosis is emerging. Animal studies have demonstrated that omega-3 has a protective effect on these connections. And some people with schizophrenia tend to have low levels of omega-3 fatty acids. These factors led the University of Vienna, Austria, to conduct a behavioral study for the effects of an omega-3 formulation on teenagers at risk for psychosis. The results, published in 2010, found that 11 out of 40 high-risk teens who had taken a placebo for 12 weeks developed clinical psychosis within a year, but only two out of 41 high-risk teens who took omega 3 succumbed to the disorder. “The magnitude of the effect they reported, 22.6 percent, was surprising,” Walker says. “And given the devastating impact of this illness, anything that shows that

The supplements used in the NIMH study will contain 1,100 milligrams of omega-3 fatty acid, about the same amount in four ounces of wild salmon.

kind of promise is worth pursuing.” The NIMH study will combine behavioral and cognitive measurements of participants, along with the biological measurements. Half of the participants will take a placebo, while the other half will take omega-3 pills containing 1,100 milligrams of omega-3 fatty acid, about the same amount in four ounces of wild salmon. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) will be used to record before-and-after images of the brain. The resulting data will allow the researchers to compare any changes in density in different brain regions. In addition, diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) will record the activity of the connections between the various brain regions, to compare any changes in the robustness of this circuitry. Participants in the study will also receive psychological counseling. “Young people showing these risk signs are typically in distress,” Walker says. “This study is an opportunity to get some support and, potentially, preventive intervention.” Walker, who has studied psychosis for more than 30 years, cautions that, no matter what the results of the study, no panacea is in the offing. “Psychosis is a class of disorders,” she explains. “As is the case with cancer, not all medicines and treatments work for all persons and types of cancer. Treatments have to be tailored.” The NIMH has made learning the neural mechanisms involved in psychosis a priority, due to the terrible economic and social toll of the illness. “Most psychotic disorders end up becoming chronic illnesses,” Walker says. “If we could prevent 20 percent of the cases, that would be great. If we could prevent 50 percent, that would be an amazing achievement.” Images: iStockPhoto.com Source: eScienceCommons

Read More........→August 01, 2012

How grandmothers' brains react to the sight of their grandchildren

"We're highlighting the brain functions of grandmothers that may play an important role in our social lives and development," says Minwoo Lee, an Emory graduate student and co-author of the study. "It's an important aspect of the human experience that's been largely left out of the field of neuroscience."

By Carol Clark: Many people lucky enough to have grown up with doting grandmothers know that they can burnish a child’s development in unique and valuable ways. Now, for the first time, scientists have scanned grandmothers’ brains while they’re viewing photos of their young grandchildren — providing a neural snapshot of this special, inter-generational bond.

Proceedings of the Royal Society B published the first study to examine grandmaternal brain function, conducted by researchers at Emory University.

“What really jumps out in the data is the activation in areas of the brain associated with emotional empathy,” says James Rilling, lead author and professor in Emory's Department of Anthropology and Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. “That suggests that grandmothers are geared toward feeling what their grandchildren are feeling when they interact with them. If their grandchild is smiling, they’re feeling the child’s joy. And if their grandchild is crying, they’re feeling the child’s pain and distress.”

In contrast, the study found that when grandmothers view images of their adult child, they show stronger activation in an area of the brain associated with cognitive empathy. That indicates they may be trying to cognitively understand what their adult child is thinking or feeling and why, but not as much from the emotional side.

“Young children have likely evolved traits to be able to manipulate not just the maternal brain, but the grand maternal brain,” Rilling says. “An adult child doesn’t have the same cute ‘factor,’ so they may not illicit the same emotional response.”

Co-authors of the study are Minwoo Lee, a PhD candidate in Emory’s Department of Anthropology, and Amber Gonzalez, a former Emory research specialist.

"What really jumps out in the data is the activation in areas of the brain associated with emotional empathy," Rilling says.

“I can relate to this research personally because I spent a lot of time interacting with both of my grandmothers,” Lee says. “I still remember warmly the moments I had with them. They were always so welcoming and happy to see me. As a child, I didn’t really understand why.”

It’s relatively rare, Lee adds, for scientists to study the older human brain outside of the problems of dementia or other aging disorders.

“Here, we’re highlighting the brain functions of grandmothers that may play an important role in our social lives and development,” Lee says. “It’s an important aspect of the human experience that has been largely left out of the field of neuroscience.”

Rilling’s lab focuses on the neural basis of human social cognition and behavior. Motherhood has been extensively studied by other neuroscientists. Rilling is a leader in researching the lesser-explored neuroscience of fatherhood.

Grandmothers interacting with grandchildren offered new neural territory.

“Evidence is emerging in neuroscience for a global, parental caregiving system in the brain,” Rilling says. “We wanted to see how grandmothers might fit into that pattern.”

Humans are cooperative breeders, meaning that mothers get help caring for their offspring, although the sources of that help vary both across and within societies.

“We often assume that fathers are the most important caregivers next to mothers, but that’s not always true,” Rilling says. “In some cases, grandmothers are the primary helper.”

In fact, the “grandmother hypothesis” posits that the reason human females tend to live long past their reproductive years is because they provide evolutionary benefits to their offspring and grandchildren. Evidence supporting this hypothesis includes a study of the traditional Hadza people of Tanzania, where foraging by grandmothers improves the nutritional status of their grandchildren. Another study of traditional communities showed that the presence of grandmothers decreases their daughters’ interbirth intervals and increases the number of grandchildren.

And in more modern societies, evidence is accumulating that positively engaged grandmothers are associated with children having better outcomes on a range of measures, including academic, social, behavior and physical health.

"If their grandchild is smiling, they're feeling the child's joy," Rilling says. "And if their grandchild is crying, they're feeling the child's pain and distress."

For the current study, the researchers wanted to understand the brains of healthy grandmothers and how that may relate to the benefits they provide to their families.

The 50 participants in the study completed questionnaires about their experiences as grandmothers, providing details such as how much time they spend with their grandchildren, the activities they do together and how much affection they feel for them. They also underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to measure their brain function as they viewed pictures of their grandchild, an unknown child, the same-sex parent of the grandchild, and an unknown adult.

The results showed that, while viewing pictures of their grandchildren, most participants showed more activity in brain areas involved with emotional empathy and movement, compared to when they were viewing the other images.

Grandmothers who more strongly activated areas involved with cognitive empathy when viewing pictures of their grandchild reported in the questionnaire that they desired greater involvement in caring for the grandchild.

Finally, compared with results from earlier study by the Rilling lab of fathers viewing photos of their children, grandmothers more strongly activated regions involved with emotional empathy and motivation, on average, when viewing images of their grandchildren.

“Our results add to the evidence that there does seem to be a global parenting caregiving system in the brain, and that grandmothers’ responses to their grandchildren maps onto it,” Rilling says.

One limitation to the study, the researchers note, is that the participants skewed towards mentally and physically healthy women who are high-functioning grandmothers.

The study opens the door to many more questions to be explored. “It would be interesting to also look at the neuroscience of grandfathers and how the brain functions of grandparents may differ across cultures,” Lee says.

An especially gratifying aspect of the project for Rilling was personally interviewing all the participants himself. “It was fun,” he says. “I wanted to get a sense of the rewards and challenges of being a grandmother.”

The main challenge many of them reported was trying not to interfere when they disagreed with the parents over how their grandchildren should be raised and what values should be instilled in them.

“Many of them also said how nice it is to not be under as much time and financial pressure as they were when raising their children,” Rilling says. “They get to enjoy the experience of being a grandmother much more than they did being parents.” This work was supported in part by the Silvia O. Conte Center for Oxytocin and Social Cognition. Source eScienceCommons:

Read More........→July 11, 2023