News by Subject Chemistry & Physics

Researchers from Tokyo Metropolitan University have discovered that fruit flies with genetic modifications to enhance glucose uptake have significantly longer lifespans. Looking at the brain cells of aging flies, they found that better glucose uptake compensates for age-related deterioration in motor functions, and led to longer life. The effect was more pronounced when coupled with dietary restrictions. This suggests healthier eating plus improved glucose uptake in the brain might lead to enhanced lifespans.

Scientists have uncovered new clues implicating a type of herpes virus as the cause of a central nervous system disease in monkeys that's similar to multiple sclerosis in people. By linking two specific T cells to the loss of myelin, scientists say the new study opens the possibility of developing an antiviral therapy that could be especially useful for newly diagnosed cases of multiple sclerosis.

A team of neuroscientists and engineers at McMaster University has created a nasal spray to deliver antipsychotic medication directly to the brain instead of having it pass through the body.

A new study conducted at the University of Turku, Finland, shows that patients with a schizophrenia spectrum disorder have an increased risk of Parkinson's disease later in life. The increased risk may be due to alterations in the brain's dopamine system caused by dopamine receptor antagonists or neurobiological effects of schizophrenia.

Researchers from the PTSD Systems Biology Consortium identified distinct biotypes for post-traumatic stress disorder, the first of their kind for any psychological disorder. These biotypes can refine the development of screening tools and may explain the varying efficacy of PTSD treatments. PTSD diagnosis is complicated by over-reliance on self-reporting of patient symptoms, particularly underreporting signs of distress due to perceived stigma. Researchers identified two PTSD biotypes with differing genetic markers and underlying mechanisms of disease.

Researchers from the University of Cambridge, the University of Milan and Google Research have used machine learning techniques to predict how proteins, particularly those implicated in neurological diseases, completely change their shapes in a matter of microseconds.

WRAIR scientists have shown that traumatic brain injury causes coordinated microRNA dysregulation followed by increased amounts of the beta-site amyloid cleaving enzyme, or BACE1, and loss of amyloid precursor protein. BACE-1 cleaves APP to generate amyloid beta peptides, a hallmark of neurodegenerative disease pathology and brain cells loss, which are the focus of several clinical trials for Alzheimer's disease. Future research will characterize the direct role of miRNAs and their relationship to BACE1 within TBI.

In three recent publications in Molecular Psychiatry, Brain and JAMA Neurology researchers from the University of Gothenburg provide convincing evidence that an in-house developed blood test for Alzheimer's disease can detect the disease early and track its course, which has major implications for a potential use in clinical practice and treatment trials.

In a new study Yale scientists looked into the brains of individuals engaged in conversation. What they observed varied significantly depending on whether or not the participants were in agreement.