Rats can tell the difference between Dutch and Japanese, suggests a new study. But it is not because some spy agency has bioengineered them to eavesdrop on conversations in Tokyo or Amsterdam. They are simply recognising the difference in rhythmic properties of the languages, says Juan Toro, a neuroscientist at the University of Barcelona in Spain, whose study is part of an effort to trace the origins of the skills that humans use to analyse speech. Human infants are extremely sensitive to the rhythmic regularities of language, which researchers think may help infants to break sound into patterns they can decipher as words. Earlier experiments showed that both tamarin monkeys and human infants can discriminate between Dutch and Japanese - two languages with rhythmic content that differs greatly. Toro's team trained rats to recognise either Dutch or Japanese - by pressing a lever in response to a short sentence - and then exposed them to sentences they had not heard before, in both languages. They found that the rats responded significantly more often to the language they had been trained in - as long as the sentences were computer-synthesised or both languages were spoken by the same person. However, the rats could not tell the difference if the sentences were played backwards or were spoken by different people. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Language; Hearing
Link ID: 6677 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Whether it's sipped from sleek stemware or a tin can, the alcohol in any type of cocktail, wine, beer, or hard liquor, for some people, is highly addictive. More than 17 million Americans already know this too well. They either abuse alcohol or have graduated to become alcoholics and have lost control of their drinking. Alcoholics have powerful cravings for the drug that typically overtake their ability to stop drinking on their own, even in the face of devastating consequences. Excess alcohol can ruin a person's health, family life, and career. Until recently, little could be done to help keep problem drinkers from consuming alcohol except for counseling programs, which can be costly and do not always work. Thanks, however, to discoveries on the chemistry of alcohol's effects, some biology-based treatments are now available and even more help is on the way. The research is leading to: An increased understanding of how various systems in the brain contribute to alcoholism. A wider range of treatment options for individuals with alcohol problems. A major step in medication development occurred in recent years when scientists discovered evidence that alcohol acts on several chemical systems in the brain to create its alluring effects. In the mid-1990s, the drug naltrexone, which targets one of these systems, termed the opioid system, was approved as a treatment for alcoholism. It's thought that alcohol's effects on the system may produce the euphoric feelings that make a person want to drink again. Naltrexone can block this reaction and helps cut cravings for alcohol in some alcoholic individuals. Copyright © 2004 Society for Neuroscience

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 6676 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Information Will Come From Clinical Trials By Marc Kaufman, Washington Post Staff Writer The world's four main pharmaceutical trade groups announced yesterday that they will publish far more data about clinical drug trials than now required by law. The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Association, along with industry groups in Europe, Japan and some developing nations, said they will begin posting expanded information about new and ongoing trials by summer. American companies are required by law to provide information on clinical trials dealing with life-threatening diseases, but the groups said yesterday they are now committed to going beyond that requirement and will provide information about trials for all diseases. "Patients and physicians have asked pharmaceutical companies to make available information about all clinical trials, not just some trials, and make that information more accessible," PhRMA President Billy Tauzin said. "We're doing this because our industry recognizes that sometimes what the law requires doesn't give patients all they need." © 2005 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Depression
Link ID: 6675 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Babies should get their Z's on their backs, most pediatricians advise parents. Beyond that, preventing Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, or SIDS—the number one cause of death in children under the age of one—has remained a mystery that researchers believe they may have finally cracked. Nino Ramirez, a neuroscientist at the University of Chicago, says that after nearly ten years spent unraveling the secrets of mouse nerve cells called pacemaker neurons he may have found the missing link that explains why some babies fall to SIDS. Ramirez and his team differentiated between two types of pacemaker cells active in the mouse brainstem that appear to control breathing—one group depends on calcium channels to operate and the other on sodium channels regulated by serotonin, a brain chemical known to influence mood. The latter held particular interest for Ramirez since prior research showed that babies who died of SIDS had serotonin deficits in brain areas that controlled breathing. "The idea with the serotonin is as follows," he explains. "It's present within the nervous system and these nerve cells are sitting in a soup of this serotonin. They need this…in order to generate this intrinsic ability to burst." That bursting triggers the respiratory system to gasp, which resets breathing. In healthy babies gasping kicks in when they start losing oxygen, but SIDS babies respond differently to plummeting oxygen levels. "We know from studies done in Germany and also from studies done in St. Louis that gasping is disturbed in these children" Ramirez explains. © ScienCentral, 2000- 2005.

Keyword: Sleep
Link ID: 6674 - Posted: 06.24.2010

GAINESVILLE, Fla. --- University of Florida stem cell scientists reported today (Jan. 3) that they have prevented blindness in mice afflicted with a condition similar to one that robs thousands of diabetic Americans of their eyesight each year. Writing in the current issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, researchers describe for the first time the link between a protein known as SDF-1 and retinopathy, a complication of diabetes and the leading cause of blindness in working-age Americans. Scientists explain how they used a common antibody to block the formation of SDF-1 in the eyeballs of mice with simulated retinopathy, ending the explosive blood vessel growth that characterizes the condition. Researchers effectively silenced SDF-1’s signal to activate normally helpful blood stem cells, which become too much of a good thing within the close confines of the eyeball. “SDF-1 is the main thing that tells blood stem cells where to go,” said Edward Scott, an associate professor of molecular genetics at the UF Shands Cancer Center and director of the Program in Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine at UF’s College of Medicine. “If you get a cut, the body makes SDF-1 at the injury site and the repair cells sniff it out. The concentration of SDF-1 is higher where the cut occurs and it quickly dissipates. But the eye is such a unique place, you’ve got this bag of jelly -- the vitreous -- that just sits there and it fills up with SDF-1. The SDF-1 doesn’t break down. It continues to call the new blood vessels to come that way, causing all the problems.”

Keyword: Vision
Link ID: 6673 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Scientists say the way airflow around the nose is more complex than that in a jumbo jet's wing. Imperial College London researchers built a 3D model of the nose and used fluid to work out how air flows around it and how it senses different smells. They say the study, in Science, could help surgeons plan operations and the development of a cure for runny noses. The structure of the nose meant air eddied, whirled and re-circulated as it passed through the nose, the team said. Principal researcher Dr Denis Doorly said: "People are used to the flows around an aeroplane being complicated but that is in some ways simpler than understanding the flows inside the nose. "The geometry of the nose is highly complex, with no straight lines or simple curves like an aircraft wing and the regime of airflow is not simply laminar or turbulent." The team, funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council, found the human sense of smell relies on a sample of air reaching the olfactory bulb at the top of the nose and that requires a sharp breathe and a high velocity shot of air to reach it. The geometry of the nose causes the air to move around in the vicinity of the bulb allowing smell to be sensed. The team mapped the air flow by using coloured beads which were put through the model noses and mapped by fast digital cameras. They also concluded the air flow was more complex than how bloods travels around the heart. (C)BBC

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste)
Link ID: 6672 - Posted: 01.07.2005

Scientists have identified a faulty gene that causes epilepsy in dogs. The finding has allowed the researchers to develop a test that could soon help owners breed out the disease. But the discovery should also aid the quest to understand the more severe human form of the condition, Lafora disease, and other similar afflictions. The latest development, reported in Science magazine, is an example of how the human and dog genome projects are expected to benefit both species. Researchers are comparing and contrasting the "life codes" of the two mammals with other animals to track down the genetic causes of ill-health. The study in Science was produced by a Canadian/UK team led from the Hospital for Sick Children (HSC) in Toronto. The researchers showed that the jerky behaviour and seizures suffered by purebred miniature wirehaired dachshunds were caused by a form of epilepsy called EPM2. The affected dogs all share a mutation in their EPM2b gene involving multiple repeats in the DNA code that prevent the proper production of protein. It is thought 5% of miniature wirehaireds in the UK have the disease and perhaps as many as 25% may be carriers of the faulty gene. Owners usually start to notice a problem with their pets when they are about six years old. Although incurable, the disease can be managed with a controlled diet and drugs. (C)BBC

Keyword: Epilepsy; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 6671 - Posted: 01.07.2005

By BARRY MEIER Faced with pressure from lawmakers and editors of medical journals, four trade groups representing the world's biggest drug makers said yesterday that their members planned to release more data about clinical drug trials. In a joint statement, the groups said their member companies had committed themselves to disclose more information about drug studies, both when the studies are started and when results are released. The groups included the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers Association in Washington and organizations in Europe and Japan. "Our companies have made a commitment to make this information available," said Caroline Loew, the American group's vice president for scientific and regulatory affairs. The plans, which are voluntary on the companies' part, appear to reflect an effort by the drug industry to defuse the controversy over clinical trials. Over the last year, companies have been accused of highlighting positive trials while playing down or burying negative data in areas like the pediatric use of antidepressants. The industry is confronting two immediate problems. Drug makers are facing the prospect of federal legislation that would require them to register studies in a public database and post their results in it as a condition for running a trial. Separately, several prestigious medical journals have said they will soon stop publishing the results of clinical drug trials unless certain data about those studies are disclosed in a public database when a trial starts. Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Depression
Link ID: 6670 - Posted: 01.07.2005

By Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News — Certain female jumping spiders demand that their mates tap dance and sing before they will mate with them, according to new research. While it is well known that birds sing and bees dance, the addition of Fred Astaire spiders to the story of "the birds and the bees" is relatively new, and suggests that spiders engage in much more sophisticated communication and behavior than previously thought. For the study, researcher Damian Elias, a graduate student in the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior at Cornell University, observed the jumping spider Habronattus dossenus and documented its success in attracting mates. The spider "sings" by producing varying patterns of seismic vibrations from its abdomen. Elias prevented some of the spiders in his study from singing by affixing their abdomens to their heads with a tiny blob of beeswax. He noticed that male spiders that both sang and danced were successful in attracting female mates. Those who just danced got little love action, which indicates that the female spider's sensory perception of the singing, along with her visual approval of the male's dance routines, are both important elements within the jumping spider mating ritual. Copyright © 2005 Discovery Communications Inc.

Keyword: Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 6669 - Posted: 06.24.2010

A BIG brain is a sign of a healthy immune system, at least as far as male birds are concerned. Anders Møller at Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris, France, and colleagues examined data from 127 bird species. They found that in species with larger brains for their body size, such as yellowhammers and barn swallows, the males also tended to have a larger spleen and bursa of Fabricius - two organs central to the immune system. The pattern did not hold for organs like the heart and liver not involved the immune system, or for females (Journal of Evolutionary Biology, DOI: 10.1111/j.1420-9101.2004.00805.x). Møller says that females choosing brainy males, perhaps by favouring a large song repertoire, may also be selecting for males with better immune systems. Previous research has shown that infections impair a bird's cognitive abilities, so a male displaying his braininess may also be showing off good genes for seeing off parasites. What's more the pattern may exist in other animals. "I can't see any reason why it should be restricted to birds," Møller says. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Neuroimmunology; Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 6668 - Posted: 06.24.2010

When Dr Sylvia Bond's son James was slow to speak she worried about his development. She decided to have his hearing checked, but what the GP of eight years - and practice lead in child health services with a diploma in child health - did not expect to hear was that her little boy was autistic. Just after his third birthday, however, that is the diagnosis she was given. Despite her experience she had missed all the signs and says it showed her just how easy it can be for the professionals as well as lay people to miss the subtle signals. Unlike many autistic children James was affectionate to his family and a very happy little boy. And although he had no proper speech by the age of two his mother was sure there was another explanation. It is very difficult to put a date on when I first noticed there was a problem, she admits. "He was not speaking. I think he might have said dog and duck once, but a trip back to the park to see if he would say them again had no response. "And he never pointed at anything. "He did not develop speech and he was a child who did not understand speech. I thought he could understand the word 'no', but he just understood the tone of voice that I used. "He did understood the word 'pop' as in ice pop. "I did not see the lack of eye contact, you don't when your child is cuddled into you. It takes someone else to discover it. "As a parent you know something is wrong, but you do not know what. "If I had not been a GP I would have probably taken him to the doctor sooner. "If I had not been a doctor I would have asked for him to go for speech and language therapy." So she refered him to an audiologist. "I thought he had a hearing problem. "I refered him myself to the hearing clinic as I was aware there were waiting lists for the speech therapists. "I thought he needed intensive speech therapy." (C)BBC

Keyword: Autism
Link ID: 6667 - Posted: 01.06.2005

A family of antibiotics including penicillin may help prevent nerve damage in a variety of neurological diseases, research has found. In lab tests on mice a team from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore found the drugs turn on protective genes. This may have a beneficial effect on conditions such as dementia, stroke and epilepsy and Lou Gehrig's disease. However, the Nature study stresses it is too soon to recommend the use of antibiotics for this purpose. There is concern that the widespread over-use of antibiotics is leading to increased levels of resistance, rendering the drugs of less and less use. In the brain, a chemical called glutamate normally excites nerves so that electrical signals can travel from one to the next. But too much of the chemical can over stimulate and kill nerves, leading to disease. Antibiotics appear to tackle the problem by triggering genes which control production of a protein called GLT1, which can transport excess glutamate away from nerve endings. Researcher Professor Jeffrey Rothstein said: "It would be extremely premature for patients to ask for or take antibiotics on their own. "Only a clinical trial can prove whether one of these antibiotics can help and is safe if taken for a long time." The researchers engineered mice to develop the equivalent of Lou Gehrig's disease, which in people causes progressive weakness and paralysis and ends in death, usually within three to five years of diagnosis. (C)BBC

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 6666 - Posted: 01.06.2005

Nearly half of extremely premature babies who survive develop a disability or learning difficulty, a study says. Another third had mild impairments, such as the need to wear glasses, by the time they reached six years old - double the average rate. The Epicure study has been monitoring the development of babies born in the UK and Ireland before 26 weeks in 1995. Researchers said the findings would help parents understand what problems their children were likely to face. More than 1,200 babies born under 26 weeks were originally involved in the study but only 314 ever left hospital and 241 were assessed in the latest round of tests. The report, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, revealed 22% had a severe disability such as cerebral palsy, blindness or profound deafness, and a further 24% had moderate disability, such as special learning needs. The rate of moderate or severe disability among the general population is about 1%. The figures also revealed that more than a third of extremely premature boys had moderate to severe disabilities - 2.4 times than the number of girls. Researchers were not able to explain what caused the disabilities, although it is thought possible adverse conditions in the womb may be the cause. But they said they hoped research in the future would look at why some have disabilities while others do not. Lead author Neil Marlow, professor of neonatal medicine at the University of Nottingham, said the findings would help doctors and parents understand and prepare for what sort of life a premature baby would have (C)BBC

Keyword: Development of the Brain
Link ID: 6665 - Posted: 01.06.2005

By Clayton Collins Ever quickly sized up a situation and just known what action to take - or had a startlingly clear first impression of a stranger that later turned out to be preternaturally astute? You may have jacked into what Malcolm Gladwell calls "the giant supercomputer in [your] unconscious." To get to know that mental motherboard, you might consider enlisting Gladwell as your IT support man. In "Blink," Gladwell cleanly decodes the science of rapid cognition, those snap judgments made with only the subtlest clues. Some of his examples: • A curator sees a Greek statue as fake despite persuasive evidence to the contrary. • A tennis coach watches a player toss up a ball and knows that on contact it will streak into the net. • A behavioral expert watches couples interact briefly and predicts correctly which will divorce eventually. Such decisions may seem arbitrary, even arrogant. When they present themselves, most of us reject them as hunches. To make them any more than a starting point in a complex decisionmaking process seems rash. Copyright © 2005 The Christian Science Monitor

Keyword: Attention
Link ID: 6664 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Traditionally viewed as supporting actors, cells known as glia may be essential for the normal development of nerve cells responsible for hearing and balance, according to new University of Utah research. The study is reported in the January 6, 2005 issue of Neuron and is co-authored by scientists at the University of Washington. "Using zebrafish as a model, we've demonstrated that glial cells play a previously unidentified role in regulating the development of sensory hair cell precursors -- the specialized neurons found in the inner ear of humans that make hearing possible. This research increases our understanding of how nerve cells develop and whether it may be possible to regenerate these types of cells in humans one day," said Tatjana Piotrowski, Ph.D., assistant professor of neurobiology and anatomy at the University of Utah School of Medicine. Scientists long have known that glial cells, or simply glia, are essential for healthy nerve cells. However, in the last 10 years scientists have learned that glia aren't just "glue" holding nerve cells together. Glia communicate with each other and even influence synapse formation between neurons. Piotrowski's research in zebrafish focuses on the development of sensory neurons known as hair cells. Like humans, zebrafish use hair cells to detect sound and motion. However, in humans hair cells are buried deep inside the inner ear making them difficult to access. Hair cells in zebrafish are located on the surface of their body and help the fish swim in groups and avoid predators.

Keyword: Glia; Hearing
Link ID: 6663 - Posted: 01.06.2005

As first-time parents, Suzanne Hill and Ralph Scibelli knew that babies often wake up during the night, but after the a year or so their son Ethan was only sleeping a few hours at a time, waking up throughout each night. "Ethan did not like to sleep," Scibelli recalls. They tried feeding him more, walking him around their Manhattan neighborhood, playing soothing music and even resorted to letting him cry in hope that he would tire himself out. Nothing worked. "We tried everything," says Hill. "Three and a half, four hours would be the maximum that he would sleep. We just said, 'Ok, well, if this is the way he is…'" Fortunately, Ethan outgrew his restless nights. But what if he hadn't? Addiction psychologist Robert Zucker, director of the University of Michigan Addiction Research Center, and his research team have found that sleep problems in boys aged three to five may be a warning sign for possible increased risk of cigarette, alcohol and other drug use in their early teens. "Children who have these [sleep] problems are…somewhat more than twice as likely to have this risk marker of early use of alcohol and early cigarette smoking and early other drug use," Zucker explains. © ScienCentral, 2000- 2005.

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Sleep
Link ID: 6662 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Recognizing faces is an innate ability in primates; even the youngest infants respond to Mom's face. So, a fascinating and central question in neurobiology is where in the hierarchy of visual processing face recognition takes place. Through a series of precise experimental manipulations of perception in human subjects, Farshad Moradi and his colleagues have gained new insight into the process. They have found that identifying a face depends on actually seeing it, as opposed to merely having the image of the face fall on the retina. In one set of experiments, the researchers took advantage of a phenomenon called "binocular rivalry" to present face images to subjects in circumstances under which the retinal input would remain perceptually invisible. In such binocular rivalry experiments, a different image is presented simultaneously to each eye. Since the visual system can only pay attention to one image at a time, the other remains "invisible"--suppressed from visual awareness. The researchers found that in such experiments the recognition of the face depended on actually perceiving it. In contrast, they found, such lower-level "aftereffects" as recognizing the orientation of the face were not affected by lack of visual awareness.

Keyword: Vision
Link ID: 6661 - Posted: 01.06.2005

From pouring a glass of milk to typing a news article, precise timing--down to the thousandth of a second--is key to the brain's control of movement. By studying how monkeys track a visual target, Javier Medina and his colleagues have gained new insights into the strategies that the brain uses to measure time. Their findings indicate that the brain measures time by assessing the duration of a process--using the internal equivalent of a neural stopwatch--as well as by computing the distance that an object being tracked has moved. However, they found that the monkeys did not use the target position as a cue about when to expect its shift to vertical motion. In their experiments, the researchers trained monkeys to track a target moving horizontally across a screen. After a fixed time interval, the target would abruptly move vertically. To probe how the monkeys were judging time, the researchers would infrequently insert an instance in which the target moved only horizontally. In such cases, because of their previous experience, the monkeys would briefly shift their gaze upward at the appropriate time to pursue the expected vertical target movement. To learn how the monkeys' brains were processing the movement information, the researchers conducted a series of experiments. The scientists measured the animals' vertical-motion eye responses when they systematically varied (1) the time interval of the horizontal motion before vertical movement, (2) the position of the target when it went vertical, and (3) the speed of horizontal target movement.

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 6660 - Posted: 01.06.2005

The human brain's remarkable flexibility to understand a variety of signals as language extends to an unusual whistle language used by shepherds on one of the Canary Islands off the northwest coast of Africa. And the way the brain processes these whistles is similar to the way it goes about deciphering English, Spanish or other spoken languages, according to research being published in tomorrow's issue of the journal Nature. "Science has developed the idea of brain areas that are dedicated to language and we are starting to understand the scope of signals that can be recognized as language," said David Corina, a University of Washington associate professor of psychology and co-author of the study. "But how far can you stretch this idea? Sign language studies have shown we can stretch the envelope and here we are expanding it in another way to a whistle language. The brain is adaptable, or plastic, in understanding a variety of forms of communication." The language studied by Corina and his colleague, Manuel Carreiras, a psychology professor at the University of La Laguna, on the island of Tenerife in the Canaries, is Silbo Gomero, or Silbo. It is primarily used by shepherds to communicate with each other over long distances of rugged terrain on the island of La Gomera, another island in the Spanish owned Canaries.

Keyword: Language
Link ID: 6659 - Posted: 01.06.2005

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Whether emotional responses to scent are a product of nature or nurture is a matter of scientific debate. But a Brown University study, published in the current issue of the International Journal of Comparative Psychology, comes down on the nurturing side. In an experiment that involved computer games and custom-made scents, researchers found that responses to new odors depended on emotions experienced while the new odor was present. If participants had a good time playing the game, they were more likely to report liking the odor they smelled. If they had an unpleasant experience, they were more likely to dislike the scent. “As humans, we’re not immediately predisposed to respond to a scent and believe that it is good or bad,” said Rachel Herz, a visiting assistant professor of psychology at Brown and the lead scientist of the study. “When we like or don’t like a smell, that is learned.” Herz conducted two experiments to test her theory of olfaction. The first included 30 female participants. All were asked to smell five scents, infused in cotton in glass jars, and rate them on a 9-point scale for pleasantness, familiarity and intensity. Most odors were familiar and pleasant – rose, vanilla, lemon and peppermint. But one was new: a unique mix of odors that included dirt, rain and hot buttered popcorn. The result was a sweet, dank, slightly unpleasant scent.

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste); Emotions
Link ID: 6658 - Posted: 06.24.2010