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...

Read More........→July 11, 2023

Do You Have a Saggy Brain?

Credit: Newcastle UniversityNew research from Newcastle University, UK, in collaboration with the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, investigated the way the human brain folds and how this ‘cortical folding’ changes with age. Losing the youthful firmness and elasticity in our skin is one of the first outward signs of ageing. Now it seems it’s not just our skin that starts to sag - but our brains too.Linking the change in brain folding to the tension on the cerebral cortex - the outer layer of neural tissue in our brains - the team found that as we age, the tension on the cortex appears to decrease. This effect was more pronounced in individuals with Alzheimer’s disease.Publishing their findings today in the academic journal PNAS, the team say this new research sheds light on the underlying mechanisms which affect brain folding and could be used in the future to help diagnose brain diseases.Lead author Dr Yujiang Wang (pictured) of Newcastle University, explains: “One of the key features of a mammalian brain is the grooves and folds all over the surface – a bit like a walnut - but until now no-one has been able to measure this folding in a consistent way.“By mapping the brain folding of over 1,000 people, we have shown that our brains fold according to a simple universal law. We also show that a parameter of the law, which is...

Read More........→December 24, 2020

Research Strongly Suggests COVID-19 Virus Enters the Brain

 A study published in Nature Neuroscience shows how spike protein crosses the blood-brain barrier.The S1 protein likely causes the brain to release inflammatory products causing a storm in the brain, researchers said.More and more evidence is coming out that people with COVID-19 are suffering from cognitive effects, such as brain fog and fatigue.And researchers are discovering why. The SARS-CoV-2 virus, like many viruses before it, is bad news for the brain. In a study published Dec.16 in Nature Neuroscience, researchers found that the spike protein, often depicted as the red arms of the virus, can cross the blood-brain barrier in mice.This strongly suggests that SARS-CoV-2, the cause of COVID-19, can enter the brain.The spike protein, often called the S1 protein, dictates which cells the virus can enter. Usually, the virus does the same thing as its binding protein, said lead author William A. Banks, a professor of medicine at the University of Washington School of Medicine and a Puget Sound Veterans Affairs Healthcare System physician and researcher. Banks said binding proteins like S1 usually by themselves cause damage as they detach from the virus and cause inflammation.“The S1 protein likely causes the brain to release cytokines and inflammatory products,” he said.In science circles, the intense inflammation caused by...

Read More........→December 21, 2020

Brain-eating Amoeba in water kills 6-year-old

A six-year-old boy died after being infected with a brain-eating amoeba that was later found in his community's water supply. Following the death, the governor of Texas in the United States has issued a disaster declaration. US media reported that the child named Josiah McIntyre died on September 8 following an infection caused by the amoeba Naegleria fowleri, a microscopic organism that breeds in the warm, fresh water of lakes and rivers and of poorly maintained swimming pools. The amoeba enters the body through the nasal membranes and penetrates to the brain, causing powerful migraine, hyperthermia, stiff neck and vomiting, then dizziness, extreme fatigue, confusion and hallucinations, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP). A spokesman for the town of Lake Jackson said that testing revealed traces of the amoeba in the tap of the garden hose at the boy's house.Traces were also found in a fountain in the town centre and in a fire hydrant in a town just one hour away from the major city of Houston, said Modesto Mundo, a city official.Grandparents of Josiah McIntyre told the Houston Chronicle that he might have been exposed to contaminated water while he was playing in a splash park downtown, shortly before he fell ill.The splash park has since been closed and several towns in Brazoria county, where Lake Jackson...

Read More........→October 05, 2020

Brain Networks Come ‘Online’ During Adolescence to Prepare Teenagers for Adult Life

Credit: Frantisek Vasa New brain networks come ‘online’ during adolescence, allowing teenagers to develop more complex adult social skills, but potentially putting them at increased risk of mental illness, according to new research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). Brain development during adolescence: red brain regions belong to the “conservative” pattern of adolescent development, while the blue brain regions belong to the “disruptive” pattern Adolescence is a time of major change in life, with increasing social and cognitive skills and independence, but also increased risk of mental illness. While it is clear that these changes in the mind must reflect developmental changes in the brain, it has been unclear how exactly the function of the human brain matures as people grow up from children to young adults. A team based in the University of Cambridge and University College London has published a major new research study that helps us understand more clearly the development of the adolescent brain. The study collected functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data on brain activity from 298 healthy young people, aged 14-25 years, each scanned on one to three occasions about 6 to 12 months apart. In each scanning session, the participants lay quietly in the scanner so that...

Read More........→July 11, 2020