Posts Tagged ‘brain’

Swedish researchers are reporting positive outcomes in a study examining the use of a device called RhinoChill, which cools the brains of heart attack patients by pumping coolant into the patient’s nose during CPR. In patients where resuscitation efforts began within 10 minutes of cardiac arrest researchers found that 59.1% of cooled patients and 29.4% of standard care patients survived to hospital discharge; 45.5% of cooled patients and 17.6% of standard care patients were neurologically intact at hospital discharge. The results also suggest that the earlier the cooling is started the better. When cooling efforts were delayed, there was no significant difference in survival when compared to those who did not receive nasal cooling. During a heart attack the heart is unable to properly pump blood to the brain (and other vital organs) which can lead to subsequent brain injury. [via Medline Plus]

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Research presented this week at the Neuroscience 2009 meeting in Chicago revealed an interesting side effect of internet use on older brains. Researchers from University of California, Los Angeles found that frequent internet use among the elderly – even those who only recently started using the web – increased brain functioning beyond their baseline. By comparing novice users to seasoned internet veterans the researchers found that even after just one week of using the internet, the novice users’ brains showed activity in areas important for working memory and decision making – activity that wasn’t apparent on brain scans prior to engagement with the web. [via Medical News Today]

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Fact or fiction? Losing one’s ability to use a particular sense will heighten the other senses. Neuroscientists at McGill University, home of the world-renowned Montreal Neurological Institute, set out to test this idea and discovered that in certain circumstances blindness can, in fact, heighten the other senses. By testing blind and sighted subjects for pitch perception and their ability to locate sounds, researchers found that blind subjects generally scored higher, not surprisingly. However, they also discovered that those who were born blind performed the best, while those who became blind as young children were slightly worse, and those who lost their vision after age 10 did no better than the sighted subjects. The theory is that a young brain could be rewired so that visual-processing areas were used for other purposes. And sure enough, by looking at MRI scans of subjects’ brains, they discovered that blind subjects who performed the best were using both the visual and auditory regions of their brains. [via New York Times]

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A report was released yesterday by the International EMF Collaborative entitled “Cellphones and Brain Tumors: 15 Reasons for Concern, Science, Spin and the Truth Behind Interphone.” Interphone was a multinational, government and industry-funded study that began in 1999 to determine whether cellphone usage increases a user’s risk of brain cancer. According to this current report, the Interphone study greatly underestimated brain tumor risk due to design flaws that included the exclusion of children and young adults in the study (the most vulnerable population), exclusion of those who died or were too ill to be interviewed due to their brain cancers, as well as the exclusion of many types of brain cancers. US Scientists that have endorsed this viewpoint, that the Interphone study had serious design flaws, include faculty at the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, Columbia University, and the University at Albany. This report was sent to government leaders today by the International EMF Collaborative, who is urging all to take a second look at the public health implications of cellphone usage. [via Business Week]

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Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) was widely pulicized in the 1990s as the human form of the cow disease bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), which is contracted from eating contaminated beef. However, there are sporadic forms of CJD that can occur for unknown reasons – unrelated to eating meat. Now, researchers have found a new variant of this fatal disease that appears to advance faster, causing dementia and even the loss of ability to speak and move. It is yet unclear what the cause is, but scientists speculate that an interaction with a genetic component may be likely.

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Japanese researchers reported this week that they successfully created functioning human brain tissue from stem cells, a world first. Until now, scientists were able to make different types of brain cells from stem cells, but never cells that formed cohesive, functioning tissues. The researchers at the Riken Center for Developmental Biology in Kobe said their new tissues are able to self-organize into four distinct zones very similar to the structure seen in human fetuses, and conduct neuro activity such as transmitting electrical signals among themselves. This breakthrough is important because the creation of functional tissues to serve as “mini organs” for research will allow us to study brain diseases, such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinsons, more extensively and perhaps, someday, without the need for research animals.

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A new study is challenging the notion that the human brain uses only glucose as its sole energy source. Researchers in Denmark and The Netherlands have found that during strenuous exercise the brain is able to metabolize lactate, a byproduct of metabolism. In addition they discovered that the brain can actually shift into a higher gear of activity. This may explain why the brain continues to function well even during times of high energy demand for the body.

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Scientists testified yesterday to the US House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Reform regarding the dangers of cell phone electromagnetic radiation. The warning is that we must not ignore the potential dangers of cell phones in causing cancer. They cited studies showing an increased risk of acoustic (hearing) nerve and salivary gland tumors on the side of the head to which a cell phone is most often set against. Very importantly, a new British study has found that children less than 20 years old were 5 times more likely to develop brain cancer at the age of 29 than those who didn’t use a cell phone. This is because electromagnetic radiation is able to penetrate deeper into the brains of a child, compared to an adult. Funding for cell phone studies in the US have been scant, and much larger trials are needed. Despite this, leading scientists say there is enough potential danger that we cannot afford to delay warnings, comparing the public health risks to smoking and lung cancer. Read more. Share your opinion.

The World Health Organization and the Multiple Sclerosis International Federation unveiled the results of the most comprehensive survey of multiple sclerosis (MS) undertaken to date that involved more than 100 countries. Results of the survey are available to the public in the form of the Atlas of MS. The exact cause of multiple sclerosis is unknown, nor is there a cure. The results of the study show that more than 1.3 million worldwide are affected with the neurological disorder, and at least twice as many women than men have it. There is also a higher risk of MS the further North or South of the equator you live. Read more.