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A molecule has the capacity to stimulate production of new neurons and restore cognitive abilities impaired by aging.
Experiments have been conducted to date on mice and rats. But after testing 1,000 chemicals suspected of having effects on the growth of neurons , Andrew Pieper and his colleagues at the University of Dallas and Atlanta think they have found a compound , named P7C3 , endowed with interesting properties.
The compound has the capacity to boost the synthesis of new neurons in an area of the brain ( the dentate gyrus ) of mice that lost the ability to regenerate because of genetic mutations created in the laboratory. Such mice are unable to learn and have severe cognitive delays . The isolated substance restores both the production of neurons in their dentate gyrus , and learning abilities .
The regenerative molecule was tested to see if it protects against effects of aging . Old rats , suffering from cognitive decline , have received the drug in their diet and were tested in the water maze , involving remembering the location of a platform hidden beneath the surface of the water. After two months, they showed an increase of 50 percent of their performance compared to untreated rats.
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Flies in detail movements are so fast that we humans are impossible to follow. The tiny brain of these aeronautical acrobats processes visual motion in just fractions of a second. There is a mathematical model to predict fairly accurately how the brain can perceive the flies so fast precise movements. However, after 50 years of research, remains a mystery how exactly are interconnected neurons in the brain of the flies.
Scientists from Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology have become the first to successfully establish the technical conditions necessary to decode the mechanisms underlying vision of the movement in flies.
Although the number of neurons in flies is comparatively small, are highly specialized, the flow of images processed with great precision as the fly flies. Flies may therefore real-time processing a vast amount of information about the movements they perceive something beyond the reach of current computers, especially if their size is limited to the brain of a fly.
The area of the fly brain that is responsible for motion detection is tiny. That area, one sixth of a cubic millimeter of brain matter contains more than 100,000 neurons, and each has multiple connections with neighboring cells.
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For the first time , researchers were able to control the heartbeat of a quail embryo by pointing an infrared laser on his heart.
The current pacemakers – pacemakers or – consist of two elements : first , a box notably allows electrical impulses deliver controlled amplitude and frequency and to measure heart rate , on the other hand, a sensor connecting housing in the heart . Wearing a pacemaker is justified when a person suffers a heart beat too slow. In this case , surgery is necessary , but it is not without risks, including infection. In addition, we can not use electric current to stimulate the faint of heart . The method is invasive and could damage irreversibly the tissues .
Another route may be possible : Michael Jenkins , Department of Biomedical Engineering at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland , U.S. , and colleagues from other U.S. universities , are developing an optical method Non -invasive to modulate vivo the heartbeat of a quail embryo.
In the late 1960s , researchers had shown that exposing the heart of a chick embryo to visible light , it causes an acceleration of his heartbeat. Moreover , this is not the first time that researchers are using a laser light to stimulate heart cells .
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Blind mice regained some ability to see through the transfer in their retinas , the gene for a protein of microbial origin.
Repair a retina of mice using a protein derived from a microorganism living in salt lakes. This is the result obtained What researchers at Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research , Basel , Switzerland .
Volker Busskamp , Botond Roska and colleagues were interested in retinitis pigmentosa , a degeneration of the retina caused by mutation of several genes . In this disease , which affects two million people worldwide , the rod photoreceptors , the most numerous ( 100 million ) and are responsible for night vision , die, causing night blindness . Then the cone photoreceptors , responsible for color vision and visual acuity , progressive loss of outer segment light -sensitive . After several years of evolution , blindness is complete , although 10-20 percent of the approximately 3 million cones are still present in the retina . These cones dormant retain some functional properties and their connections with the retinal neurons that transmit visual information to the brain.
The researchers had the idea of using them to try to regenerate a nerve messages in response to light , so a visual message. For this it was necessary that these cells produce a type of pigment rhodopsin , the protein that , in living , transforms light photons into an electrical signal . The choice of researchers has focused on the Halorhodopsin , a photosensitive protein known microorganisms in saline environments , in this case the span Natrosomonas pharaonisPresent in salt lakes of Egypt and Kenya .
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The practice of acupuncture dates back nearly 4000 years, and is deemed to relieve some chronic pain. How hands produisentelles effects? Find out by U.S. neurologists have practiced acupuncture on mice , to analyze the substances released by cells located near the site of stimulation . The placement of needles in the legs of mice , in traditional acupuncture points , calmed their inflammatory pain, following the injection of irritating substances.
Using microscopic methods of sampling , biologists have made small biopsies near the sites of implantation of the needles and found the presence of high concentrations of adenosine , a molecule produced analgesia from the ATP molecule, the source of energy for the body . The tip of the needle damages the membrane of cells on their path , causing a “leak “of ATP out of cells .
Biologists have shown that adenosine binds to a particular class of receptors on the surface of neurons , the adenosine receptor type 1. They also demonstrated that acupuncture has no effect when these receptors are blocked by pharmacological or mice that are genetically devoid .
This study opens the way for treatments combining acupuncture and pain medication. For example , an active ingredient, deoxycoformycin , promotes the production of adenosine from ATP .
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Science has tried for a long time to explain why the brain of a baby is particularly flexible and why it changes so easily. Is it because the babies have to learn a lot? A group of researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-organization in Gottingen (Germany), Princeton University (United States) and other institutions, has now proposed a new explanation: Maybe it’s because the brain has yet to grow.
Using a combination of experiments, mathematical models and computer simulations, researchers have shown that neural connections in the visual cortex of cats are restructured during the growth phase and that this restructuring can be explained by recourse to processes capable of organizing themselves . The study was led by Matthias Kaschuba, former fellow of this Institute and now at the University of Princeton.
The brain is constantly changing. The neural structures are not fixed but change with each step of learning and every experience. However, certain areas of the brain of a newborn baby are particularly flexible. In animal experiments, the development of the visual cortex can be strongly influenced in the first months of life, for example, by different visual stimuli.
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Rui Costa , principal investigator of the Neuroscience program Champalimaud Foundation , in collaboration with Xin Jin National Institutes of Health United States , has just published an article [ 1] in Nature which shows that the activity of some neurons the basal ganglia , areas of gray matter located within the cerebrum, may report such as a traffic light, the beginning and end of an action .
This brain activity is essential for learning and executing a sequence of specific actions , tasks for which patients suffering from Parkinson’s disease or Huntington often encounter difficulties .
Rui Costa said that a patient with Parkinson’s can be difficult to start a simple action such as the act of walking . If the patient is helped , he manages to work perfectly , but then he meets trouble stopping , and will then continue to walk. Neurons that Rui Costa and Xin Jin studied are associated with the ability to initialize and finalize this type of task.
This discovery is the fruit of three years of research on rats. It allows to speculate on a possible mechanism that would explain why patients with Parkinson’s and Huntington , who lost neurons in these brain areas , signaling have difficulty learning and carrying out specific tasks . The next step for this team will identify what distinguishes the cells ‘give the green light ‘ from their neighbors who ” give the red light ‘using such molecular markers .
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= > FLIP- L , a protein double -play
The protein – FLIP L is known for its anti -apoptotic , that is to say its ability to prevent the famous cellular suicide , apoptosis .
A research team composed of scientists from the Research Institute of the Hospital Vall d’Hebron (Barcelona ) [1] , the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB ) [2 ] and the University of Lleida [ 3 ] , has discovered a new role for this protein . Indeed , they found that in neurons , in addition to its anti -apoptotic protein FLIP -L plays an essential role in the differentiation of nerve cells , to the point of being indispensable to the development of connections between neurons .
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A research team composed of scientists from the Cajal Institute in Madrid and the Institute of Genetics and Biophysics in Naples , has discovered a new population of neurons hitherto unknown , which is capable of generating the cerebral center of emotions . These neurons have the particularity to express a gene called Orthopedia or OTP . Through this gene , these cells are able to leave the hypothalamus [1 ] , from which they originate, and move to forebrain [2 ] where they mix with other neurons already in place , forming the Amygdala brain [ 3] , the brain region which are regulated emotions such as anger , anxiety or fear.
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A recent study by researchers at the Institute of Experimental Medicine, Hungarian Academy of Sciences has revealed the molecular mechanisms involved during the learning process . This study was published in the journal Science .
Historically, neurologists agree that the learning process based on strengthening connections between neurons . Many studies have revealed that synapses , the connections between neurons , grow in life , which constitute the foundations of learning mechanisms. However , no study has identified the mechanisms by which nerve cells send information they want to strengthen synapses .
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Experiments have been conducted to date on mice and rats. But after testing 1,000 chemicals suspected of having effects on the growth of neurons , Andrew Pieper and his colleagues at the University of Dallas and Atlanta think they have found a compound , named P7C3 , endowed with interesting properties.
The current pacemakers – pacemakers or – consist of two elements : first , a box notably allows electrical impulses deliver controlled amplitude and frequency and to measure heart rate , on the other hand, a sensor connecting housing in the heart . Wearing a pacemaker is justified when a person suffers a heart beat too slow. In this case , surgery is necessary , but it is not without risks, including infection. In addition, we can not use electric current to stimulate the faint of heart . The method is invasive and could damage irreversibly the tissues .
Repair a retina of mice using a protein derived from a microorganism living in salt lakes. This is the result obtained What researchers at Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research , Basel , Switzerland .