By Kay Lazar Attorney General Martha Coakley’s office joined a federal lawsuit yesterday that contends that Johnson & Johnson paid tens of millions of dollars in kickbacks to get its drugs, especially the powerful antipsychotic Risperdal, prescribed in nursing homes. The action was taken as Coakley’s office disclosed that it is also scrutinizing companies that market antipsychotics to Massachusetts nursing homes. These drugs are widely used in some homes for residents suffering from dementia, a condition that puts them at greater risk of death when given antipsychotics. Antipsychotics were approved to treat people with severe mental illnesses, such as schizophrenia, but it is legal for physicians to prescribe them “off label’’ to treat people with dementia. Pharmaceutical companies are prohibited from marketing or promoting off-label uses of their products. “The inappropriate off-label marketing of antipsychotic drugs to nursing homes is a significant health and safety issue for our seniors,’’ Coakley said in a statement released by her office. “We have taken strong action on this issue in the past and are continuing to monitor it very closely moving forward.’’ Coakley’s office declined further comment, citing the pending litigation. The Globe reported Monday that 28 percent of Massachusetts nursing home residents were given antipsychotics last year. © 2010 NY Times Co.

Keyword: Schizophrenia; Alzheimers
Link ID: 13881 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Liam Creedon, Press Association A soldier blinded by a grenade in Iraq today described how his life has been transformed by ground-breaking technology that enables him to "see" with his tongue. Lance Corporal Craig Lundberg, 24, from Walton, Liverpool, can read words, identify shapes and walk unaided thanks to the BrainPort device, despite being totally blind. The Liverpool fan, who plays blind football for England, lost his sight after being struck by a rocket propelled grenade while serving in Basra in 2007. He was faced with the prospect of relying on a guide dog or cane for the rest of his life. But he was chosen by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to be the first person to trial a pioneering device - the BrainPort, which could revolutionise treatment for the blind. The BrainPort converts visual images into a series of electrical pulses which are sent to the tongue. The different strength of the tingles can be read or interpreted so the user can mentally visualise their surroundings and navigate around objects. The device is a tiny video camera attached to a pair of sunglasses which are linked to a plastic "lolly pop" which the user places on their tongue to read the electrical pulses. L/Cpl Lundberg explained: "It feels like licking a nine volt battery or like popping candy. ©independent.co.uk

Keyword: Vision; Robotics
Link ID: 13880 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Diane Daniel When Claudette Broyles tries to describe to friends how she feels, she likens herself to a balloon on a string, tied to a post. "I'm constantly rocking and swaying, but the level changes," said Broyles, 60, of Woodstock, Va. "If I'm having an average day, then it's like I'm a balloon in a mild breeze. If I'm having a bad day, it's like it's really windy." I hadn't heard the balloon analogy before, but I could relate. Broyles and I suffer from mal de debarquement syndrome (MdDS), an uncommon balance disorder that one researcher describes as "motion hallucination." For weeks, months or even years at a time, we feel that we are rocking, bobbing, swaying, even though diagnostic tests for balance, hearing and vision show up normal. The name for the illness is French for "disembarkation sickness," so called because it most frequently occurs after being on a boat. Of course, many people have experienced the swaying sensations that occur just after a boat trip. But for those with MdDS, that feeling doesn't let up; it persists with varying degrees of severity, causing everything from clumsiness to the inability to walk without some kind of support. Just how many sufferers there are is unknown, says neurologist Yoon-Hee Cha, who this year launched a study funded in part by the National Institutes of Health, the first time federal money has been used for research into the syndrome. © 2010 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 13879 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By HARRIET BROWN As a woman whose height and weight put me in the obese category on the body-mass-index chart, I cringed when Michelle Obama recently spoke of putting her daughters on a diet. While I’m sure the first lady’s intentions are good, I’m also sure that her comments about childhood obesity will add yet another layer to the stigma of being overweight in America. Last August, Dr. Delos M. Cosgrove, a cardiac surgeon and chief executive of the prestigious Cleveland Clinic, told a columnist for The New York Times that if he could get away with it legally, he would refuse to hire anyone who is obese. He probably could get away with it, actually, because no federal legislation protects the civil rights of fat workers, and only one state, Michigan, bans discrimination on the basis of weight. Dr. Cosgrove may be unusually blunt, but he is far from alone. Public attitudes about fat have never been more judgmental; stigmatizing fat people has become not just acceptable but, in some circles, de rigueur. I’ve sat in meetings with colleagues who wouldn’t dream of disparaging anyone’s color, sex, economic status or general attractiveness, yet feel free to comment witheringly on a person’s weight. Over the last few years, fat people have become scapegoats for all manner of cultural ills. “There’s an atmosphere now where it’s O.K. to blame everything on weight,” said Dr. Linda Bacon, a nutrition researcher and the author of “Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth About Your Weight” (Benbella, 2008). “If we’re worried about climate change, someone comes out with an article about how heavier people weigh more, so they require more fuel, and they blame the climate change crisis on fatter people. We have this strong belief system that it’s their fault, that it’s all about gluttony or lack of exercise.” Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Obesity
Link ID: 13878 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Helen Thomson HORROR films are simply a disconcerting watch for the majority of us, but for Jane Barrett they are literally torturous. She writhes in agony whenever the actors on the screen feel pain. "When I see violence in films I have an extreme reaction," she says. "I simply have to close my eyes. I start to feel nauseous and have to breathe deeply." She is just one of many people who suffer from a range of disorders that give rise to "extreme empathy". Some of these people, like Barrett, empathise so strongly with others that they experience the same physical feelings - whether it's the tickle of a feather or the cut of a knife. Others, who suffer from a disorder known as echopraxia, just can't help immediately imitating the actions of others, even in inappropriate situations. Far from being mere curiosities, understanding these conditions could have many pay-offs for neuroscience, such as illuminating conditions like phantom pain. They may even help answer the age-old question of whether empathy really is linked to compassion. There is a general consensus that empathy-linked conditions arise from abnormalities in the common mechanisms for empathy found in all humans: although few of us experience sensations as powerful as Barrett's, we all wince at a brutal foul on the football field and feel compassion for someone experiencing grief. Many studies have suggested that our capacity for empathy arises from a specific group of neurons, labelled mirror neurons. First discovered in macaque monkeys, they are situated in and around the premotor cortex and parietal lobe - regions that span the top of the brain near the middle of the head. These neurons fire both when you perform an action and when you see someone else perform that action. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd

Keyword: Emotions
Link ID: 13877 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Lisa Grossman The molecule that lets snakes sense heat is the same one that makes wasabi feel fiery. Scientists have known for decades that some snakes use specialized holes called pit organs to “see” the heat radiating from prey. Now, molecular biologists have pinpointed the protein that gives pit-bearing snakes — vipers, boas and pythons — this sixth sense. The culprit is called TRPA1, a protein whose human counterpart is known as the “wasabi receptor” for its role in sensing the potent condiment. The results are reported online March 14 in Nature. “This is one of the first really interesting new findings in that species” in 20 years, comments snake-sense specialist Ken Catania of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, who was not associated with the study. “It’s the kind of paper that makes me have to go and revise my class lectures.” Scientists had thought that snakes’ sensitivity to heat comes from the exceptionally thin tissue in pit organs. Just as it takes less heat to boil a cup of water than a pot, it takes less heat to stimulate pit organ tissue than a mammal’s skin. But what was happening on a molecular level had never been explored. “We’ve been trying to address this question for a long time, several years,” says study coauthor David Julius of the University of California, San Francisco. “The technology wasn’t really right for us to do that until recently.” Recent advances in high-throughput genetic screening that can sift through hundreds of genes quickly made the study possible. © Society for Science & the Public 2000 - 2010

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste); Vision
Link ID: 13876 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Rossella Lorenzi An international team of researchers has identified intact neurons and cerebral cells in a mummified medieval brain, according to a study published in the journal Neuroimage. Found inside the skull of a 13th century A.D. 18-month-old child from northwestern France, the brain had been fixed in formalin solution since its discovery in 1998. "Although reduced by about 80 percent of its original weight, it has retained its anatomical characteristics and most of all, to a certain degree its cell structures," anatomist and palaeopathologist Frank Ruhli, head of the Swiss Mummy Project at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, told Discovery News. The brain was the only tissue preserved in the infant's skeletonized body. "It is a unique case of naturally-occurring preservation of human brain tissue in the absence of other soft tissues," Ruhli said. The brain appeared almost intact. The grooves and furrows -- gyri and sulci -- that make up the surface of the brain's cerebral cortex were still clearly visible, as well the frontal, temporal and occipital lobe. Amazingly, the cellular structure had also been preserved to a certain degree. Microscopic examination of the tissue revealed gray and white matter, blood vessels and large neurons near the the hippocampus area, the memory-making region of the brain. The cells had mostly retained their original shape as well as the dendrites, the short, branched fibers that extend from the cell body of a neuron. © 2010 Discovery Communications, LLC.

Keyword: Miscellaneous
Link ID: 13875 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Vilayanur S. Ramachandran and Diane Rogers-Ramachandran Although our perception of the world seems effortless and instantaneous, it actually involves considerable image processing, as we have noted in many of our previous columns. Curiously enough, much of the current scientific understanding of that process is based on the study of visual illusions. Analysis and resolution of an image into distinct features begin at the earliest stages of visual processing. This was discovered in cats and monkeys by a number of techniques, the most straightforward of which was to use tiny needles—microelectrodes—to pick up electrical signals from cells in the retina and the areas of the brain associated with vision (of which there are nearly 30). By presenting various visual targets to monitored animals, investigators learned that cells in early-processing brain areas are each sensitive mainly to changes in just one visual parameter, not to others. For instance, in the primary visual cortex (V1, also called area 17), the main feature extracted is the orientation of edges. In the area known as V4 in the temporal lobes, cells react to color (or, strictly speaking, to wavelengths of light, with different cells responding to different wavelengths). Cells in the area called MT are mainly interested in direction of movement. One characteristic of these cells that may seem surprising is that their activity when stimulated is not constant. A neuron that responds to red, for instance, will initially fire vigorously but taper off over time as it adapts, or “fatigues,” from steady exposure. Although part of this adaptation may result from depletion of neurotransmitters, it also likely reflects the evolutionary logic that the goal of the cell is to signal change rather than a steady state (that is, if nothing changes, there is literally nothing for the cell to get excited about). © 2010 Scientific American,

Keyword: Vision
Link ID: 13874 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Abigail Baird In 2009, Miley Cyrus reportedly made an astonishing 25 million dollars. Most of that money came from album sales, which were reported to be slightly over 4 million during that year. Four million…Four million?! Have you heard Miley Cyrus sing? Are there really four million kids out there willing to spend their hard-earned babysitting money on a Miley Cyrus album because they deeply love listening to her sing? Well, according to the findings of a study recently published in Neuroimage, selling four million albums does not translate to having four million people like your music. The study reports that there is good reason to believe that a lot of those purchases were made out of fear -- a fear well known to adolescents all over America: terror of social rejection. The fear of social rejection is so strong in adolescents because their relationships are essential for passing on the lessons that will enable them to join adult society. In order to do this properly and efficiently, teenagers come equipped with the ability to learn fast and furiously from their peers, especially those who wield more social power -- who are older or more popular. Although this system developed because it helps the teen transition to adulthood, it has proven an excellent principle upon which to base economic decisions. The popular kids dictate teen culture, and if they endorse it (Twilight, anyone?) it will sell. Gregory S. Berns, the chair of Neuroeconomics at Emory University, and his colleagues set out to understand more about the neural and behavioral mechanics of social influence on decisions about purchasing music. The researchers’ basic question was: When people change their behavior based on social influence, is it their actual preferences that change, or simply their behavior? © 2010 Scientific American,

Keyword: Development of the Brain; Emotions
Link ID: 13873 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By SAM DOLNICK WHEN most people think of hunger in America, the images that leap to mind are of ragged toddlers in Appalachia or rail-thin children in dingy apartments reaching for empty bottles of milk. Once, maybe. But a recent survey found that the most severe hunger-related problems in the nation are in the South Bronx, long one of the country’s capitals of obesity. Experts say these are not parallel problems persisting in side-by-side neighborhoods, but plagues often seen in the same households, even the same person: the hungriest people in America today, statistically speaking, may well be not sickly skinny, but excessively fat. Call it the Bronx Paradox. “Hunger and obesity are often flip sides to the same malnutrition coin,” said Joel Berg, executive director of the New York City Coalition Against Hunger. “Hunger is certainly almost an exclusive symptom of poverty. And extra obesity is one of the symptoms of poverty.” The Bronx has the city’s highest rate of obesity, with residents facing an estimated 85 percent higher risk of being obese than people in Manhattan, according to Andrew G. Rundle, an epidemiologist at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University. But the Bronx also faces stubborn hunger problems. According to a survey released in January by the Food Research and Action Center, an antihunger group, nearly 37 percent of residents in the 16th Congressional District, which encompasses the South Bronx, said they lacked money to buy food at some point in the past 12 months. That is more than any other Congressional district in the country and twice the national average, 18.5 percent, in the fourth quarter of 2009. Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Obesity
Link ID: 13872 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Elizabeth Barrett Struggling to hear someone properly mid-conversation during a noisy party or gathering may be something most of us have experienced at one time or another. But a person's brain rather than their ear could be to blame for the inability to "zoom in" on an individual you want to hear - the so-called "cocktail party" problem, new research suggested today. The study being carried out by Deafness Research UK scientists at the University College London Ear Institute intimated the brain appears to play a greater role than was previously thought in the auditory process. It is hoped the research, looking at the brain's ability to focus its listening attention on a single speaker amid a mixture of background chatter, but at the same time immediately respond if someone calls our name, will benefit the deaf and hard of hearing. Particularly those with cochlear implants or "bionic ears" and hearing aids, which traditionally struggle in noisy environments. Vivienne Michael, chief executive of Deafness Research UK, said: "Scientists are particularly interested in how the central auditory system is able to cope with noisy environments; a major challenge for hearing research over the next decade will be to improve the performance of cochlear implant devices. ©independent.co.uk

Keyword: Hearing; Attention
Link ID: 13871 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Robert Epstein On Wednesday, March 10, I had the pleasure of making love with Scientific American ’s editor-in-chief, Mariette DiChristina—in front of a large audience, no less. Hey, calm down. We didn’t make love with each other. We did something even better. We showed about a hundred smart, skeptical New Yorkers that we could, fairly easily and on demand, increase the love that feel people toward each other—people who are already in love, people who are just friends, and even total strangers. The venue was the classy 92Y Tribeca, the fairly new home of art and intellect in lower Manhattan, and the excuse was Scientific American Mind ’s January/February cover story about how science can help you fall in love. Our presentation began, consistent with the occasion, with a prolonged hug that prompted laughter and applause. When, eventually, the embrace ended, I asked four volunteers to come up on stage, and I paired them off into couples that had never met before. I then asked them, on a scale of 1 to 10 (where 1 was low and 10 was high), a) how much they liked each other, b) how much they loved each other, c) how close they felt to each other, and d) how attracted they were to each other. Next, I asked the individuals in each couple simply to look deeply into each other’s eyes for two minutes in an exercise I call “Soul Gazing.” After the giggling stopped, they got down to business and started looking quite serious. Then I asked for those numbers again: liking, loving, closeness and attraction. To the delight and astonishment of the audience, the numbers went up for all four people—14 percent overall. © 2010 Scientific American,

Keyword: Emotions; Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 13870 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Andy Coghlan What does a rattlesnake's night vision have in common with the taste of wasabi sauce? It turns out that when some snakes "thermally image" their prey, they employ receptors similar to those we use to sense pungency from wasabi. Unlike the human receptors, which respond to odour molecules, the snakes' thermal receptors respond directly to heat, triggering nerve impulses that their brain interprets as an image. "It's hard to know exactly what the snake 'sees', but one assumes that the thermal image in some way depicts the relative thermal intensity of an object or animal," says David Julius of the University of California, San Francisco, whose team has found the link. "It's probably not unlike a thermal camera." Julius's team compared gene activity in different types of nerve cell from diamondback rattlesnakes, which all have shallow pits on their faces that detect heat. They found that in nerves that feed the pits, a gene called TRPA1 was 400 times more active than elsewhere. The gene makes a protein that activates the cells when it detects heat from objects at more than 27 °C. Boas and pythons have similar molecules on their snouts. Journal reference: Nature, DOI: 10.1038/nature08943 © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste); Evolution
Link ID: 13869 - Posted: 06.24.2010

by Michael Torrice Whether it involves gambling away one's life savings or committing one murder after another, a psychopath inevitably leaves the rest of us wondering: What was going on in his head? Now researchers report that part of the answer may be hypersensitivity to rewards, which may create a pathological drive for money, sex, and status. All psychopaths share two characteristic traits: an inability to empathize with others' emotions, such as the fear in a person's face, and impulsive, anti-social behavior, such as reckless risk taking or excessive aggression. Neuroscientists have pinpointed neural mechanisms that may cause psychopaths' lack of empathy. But very little research has looked at what leads to impulsivity-which in some ways might be more important, because it can help predict a psychopath's tendency towards violent crime. Neuroscientist Joshua Buckholtz of Vanderbilt University in Nashville and his colleagues decided to focus on a system of interconnected brain regions called the mesolimbic system, which motivate us to hunt for rewards by releasing the neurotransmitter dopamine. Drugs like heroine-to which psychopaths are also more susceptible—can push circuits in this system into overdrive, leaving addicts compulsively seeking another hit. The researchers hypothesized that psychopaths might also overreact to other rewards. To test their hypothesis, the scientists studied how normal personality is affected by variations in the nucleus accumbens, a part of the mesolimbic system involved in motivation. They gave 30 volunteers a small dose of amphetamine, a stimulant, and used a PET scanner to measure how much dopamine their nucleus accumbens released. © 2010 American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Keyword: Aggression; Emotions
Link ID: 13868 - Posted: 06.24.2010

A gene that causes a fatal childhood brain disorder can also cause adults to develop peripheral neuropathy, a condition resulting in weakness and decreased sensation in the hands and limbs, according to a study by researchers at the National Institutes of Health and other institutions. The study is the first to show that different mutations in the same gene cause the two seemingly unrelated disorders. Inherited peripheral neuropathies are a diverse group of disorders that cause loss of muscle tissue in the hands, feet, and lower legs of affected patients, usually starting in adulthood. Various genetic causes have been identified for Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT) (http://www.nature.com/ejhg/journal/v17/n6/pdf/ejhg200931a.pdf.), the broad category of inherited peripheral neuropathy that affects approximately 125,000 people in the United States. The peripheral nervous system consists of nerves that reside or extend outside of the brain and spinal cord. In the current study, the researchers determined that persons with a CMT-like neuropathy have a mutation in the same gene that causes Menkes disease, a severe brain disorder that begins in infancy and is fatal if not treated. This gene, called ATP7A, codes for a protein needed to move the trace metal copper between different compartments within the body's cells, or out of cells altogether. "The findings provide insight into how peripheral nerves function and may ultimately lead to new treatments for some peripheral neuropathies," said Alan E. Guttmacher, M.D., acting director of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), the NIH Institute that collaborated in the study.

Keyword: Movement Disorders; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 13867 - Posted: 03.15.2010

By THE NEW YORK TIMES Dr. Robert A. King and Dr. James F. Leckman of the Yale School of Medicine recently joined the Consults blog to answer readers’ questions about Tourette’s syndrome. Here, Dr. Leckman and Dr. King respond to readers asking about living with the strange movements, tics and vocalizations of Tourette’s, which can be socially difficult and, in some cases, lifelong. Do You Tell a Teacher About Tourette’s? Jen from Brookline, Mass., asks: My daughter started exhibiting tics at age 2 and was diagnosed with Tourrette’s at age 3. Now she’s 5 and will start kindergarten in September. I wrestle with whether to tell her teachers about it right off the bat, or wait and see if it becomes an issue. Her symptoms, so far, have been mild and not always evident. I would hate for her to be “labeled” unnecessarily (with whatever negatives come with that), but on the other hand, I feel that not being forthright is dishonest, and could equally be a disservice to my daughter. Any advice from those who have recently BTDT? Dr. King and Dr. Leckman respond: Tics wax and wane. For some, the tics will subside early in life. For others, the worst-ever tics occur at around 10 years of age or later in life. Unlike your daughter, some children with Tourette’s who begin school have had bad periods during which the tics are severe. It is likely that such children will have bad periods in the future. If the tics are pronounced enough that a teacher or peers are likely to notice and comment, it is better to be proactive and to be prepared. Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company

Keyword: Tourettes; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 13866 - Posted: 06.24.2010

WASHINGTON - Vaccines that contain a mercury-based preservative called thimerosal cannot cause autism on their own, a special U.S. court ruled on Friday, dealing one more blow to parents seeking to blame vaccines for their children's illness. The special U.S. Court of Federal Claims ruled that vaccines could not have caused the autism of an Oregon boy, William Mead, ending his family's quest for reimbursement. "The Meads believe that thimerosal-containing vaccines caused William's regressive autism. As explained below, the undersigned finds that the Meads have not presented a scientifically sound theory," Special Master George Hastings, a former tax claims expert at the Department of Justice, wrote in his ruling. Story continues below ↓advertisement | your ad here The Meads had filed a civil lawsuit in Oregon state court against a number of pharmaceutical companies alleging that the thimerosal additive in many pediatric vaccines significantly contributed to the development of William's autism, Hastings wrote. While the state court determined the autism was vaccine-related, Hastings said overwhelming medical evidence showed otherwise. The theory presented by the Meads and experts who testified on their behalf "was biologically implausible and scientifically unsupported", Hasting wrote. Copyright 2010 Reuters.

Keyword: Autism; Neurotoxins
Link ID: 13865 - Posted: 03.13.2010

By Jesse Emspak A drug targeting dopamine receptors might be able to "kick-start" an injured brain, enabling certain kinds of vegetative and minimally conscious patients to recover faster. Esteban Fridman of the FLENI hospital in Buenos Aires thinks the crux of the problem for such patients lies in their neuron-connecting axons. They are so badly damaged that they have a difficult time carrying chemical signals, or neurotransmitters, from neuron to neuron. Axons get disrupted when they are subject to stresses such as cranial impact—as when a fighter gets hit in the head or a driver smacks into the steering wheel in a car accident. As a possible treatment for such damage, Fridman has focused on apomorphine, which binds to the brain's dopamine receptors. Dopamine, a neurotransmitter well known for its role in Parkinson's disease, is part of the mechanism controlling arousal and motivated behavior; it also plays a role in consciousness disorders. Fridman hypothesizes that apomorphine might work by acting in place of dopamine. Flooding the injured brain with the chemical might stimulate it enough to repair the connections, enabling the patients to reach full consciousness. He notes the drug wouldn't work in cases where the brain has been deprived of oxygen or blood, because the damage is more widespread. Terri Schiavo, a Florida woman whose care sparked a nationwide controversy that peaked in 2005, was in a vegetative state caused by that kind of injury. © 2010 Scientific American,

Keyword: Attention
Link ID: 13864 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Rachel Ehrenberg People deceive their taste buds every day — a dash of Sweet'N Low in the coffee, perhaps, a diet soda or a stick of sugarless gum. These little white lies seem to cover up harmless, even healthy choices. After all, fooling the mouth with artificial sweeteners provides a fix without the calories or the cavities. But these sweeteners aren’t just tricking the taste buds on the tongue. Taste, scientists are discovering, is a whole-body sensation. There are taste cells in the stomach, intestine and, evidence suggests, the pancreas, colon and esophagus. These sensory cells are part of an ancient battalion tasked with guiding food choices since long before nutrition labels, Rachael Ray or even agriculture existed. While taste cells in the mouth make snap judgments about what should be let inside, new work suggests that gut taste cells serve as specialized ground forces, charged with preparing the digestive system for the aftermath of the tongue’s decisions. Stimulating these gut cells triggers a complex series of events that can dial down, or amp up, the digestion and absorption of the body’s fuel. When hit by bitter — potentially toxic — substances, gut taste cells sound an alarm that may lead to slower absorption or spur vomiting. And when the gut’s taste sensors encounter something sweet, they send a “prepare for fuel” missive that results in cranked-up insulin levels in the blood. Though scientists don’t fully understand what follows, studies hint at a tantalizing, if convoluted, connection between gut taste cell activity and metabolism. © Society for Science & the Public 2000 - 2010

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste); Obesity
Link ID: 13863 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Huw Williams Researchers say they've solved the mystery of why some chickens hatch out half-male and half-female. About one in every 10,000 chickens is gynandromorphous, to use the technical term. In medieval times, they might have been burned at the stake, as witches' familiars. But now these chickens are shedding important new light on how birds, and perhaps reptiles, develop. It used to be thought that hormones instructed cells to develop in male or female-specific ways. That's what happens in mammals, including humans, and it leads to secondary sexual characteristics like facial hair for men or breasts for women. But scientists at the Roslin Institute and the University of Edinburgh say they have discovered that bird cells don't need to be programmed by hormones. Instead they are inherently male or female, and remain so even if they end up mixed together in the same chicken. It means a half-and-half chicken will have totally different plumage, body shape, and muscle structure on the two halves of its body. It even affects the wattles on the bird's head, and the spurs on its legs. They will be larger on the cockerel half, and smaller on the hen half, of the same bird. Dr Michael Clinton of the Roslin Institute led the research, which has just been published in the scientific journal Nature. He said the findings were a surprise. Dr Clinton explained: "We looked at these birds initially expecting them not to be half-male and half-female. We thought there'd be a mutation on one side of the body. But we found that they were half-male and half-female and that's what actually showed us that the system was different in birds and mammals." (C)BBC

Keyword: Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 13862 - Posted: 03.12.2010