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Without glial cells, animals lose their senses

Sensory neurons have always put on a good show. But now, it turns out, they'll be sharing the credit. In groundbreaking research to appear in the October 31 issue of Science, Rockefeller University scientists show that while neurons play the lead role in detecting sensory information, a second type of cell, the glial cell, pulls the strings behind the scenes. The findings, point to a mechanism that may explain not only how glia are required for bringing sensory information into the brain but also how glia may influence connections between neurons deep within in it.

Without Glial Cells, Animals Lose Their Senses

Sensory neurons have always put on a good show. But now, it turns out, they'll be sharing the credit. In groundbreaking research to appear in the October 31 issue of Science, Rockefeller University scientists show that while neurons play the lead role in detecting sensory information, a second type of cell, the glial cell, pulls the strings behind the scenes.

Brains Work Best At Age of 39

Scientists at the University of California Los Angeles are reporting that while some people may think "life begins at 40," all it seems to do is slow down. According to recent research, at age 39 our brain reaches its peak speed, and it's all down hill after that. "The loss of a fatty skin that coats the nerve cells, called neurons, during middle age causes the slowdown, experts say. The coating acts as insulation, similar to the plastic covering on an electrical cable, and allows for fast bursts of signals around the body and brain. When the sheath deteriorates, signals passing along the neurons in the brain slow down. This means reaction times in the body are slower too."

Neurons Derived from Embryonic Stem Cells Restore Muscle Function After Injury

Newswise - Dalhousie Medical School researchers have discovered that embryonic stem cells may play a critical role in helping people with nerve damage and motor neuron diseases, such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), regain muscular strength.

Neurons Derived From Embryonic Stem Cells Restore Muscle Function After Injury

Dalhousie Medical School researchers have discovered that embryonic stem cells may play a critical role in helping people with nerve damage and motor neuron diseases, such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), regain muscular strength.

How Signals Flow Between Neurons: New Research Explains Membrane Fusion At Synapse

Imagine a bathtub with two soap bubbles colliding but never fusing. Then you add detergent, and the surface of the water goes flat as the walls of the bubbles collapse and merge.

Without Glial Cells, Animals Lose Their Senses

Scientists show that while neurons play the lead role in detecting sensory information, the glial cell pulls the strings behind the scenes. The findings point to a mechanism that may explain not only how glia are required for bringing sensory information into the brain.

Mammals Can be Stimulated to Regrow Damaged Inner Retina Nerve Cells

The mouse retina has now been show to regenerate new neurons after damage. This is the first time evidence of regrowth of inner retinal nerve cells has been reported in mammals. The results suggest at least some types of retinal damage can be repaired. The findings hold promise for treating macular degeneration and other retinal disorders that lead to blindness.

Researchers Create Robot Controlled by Cells from Rat Brain

A team of UK scientists at the University of Reading created a robot with biological brain tissue serving as its central processing unit. The team integrated cultured nerve cells and neurons from a rat's brain into the robot, which it named Gordon.

New clue emerges for cellular damage in Huntington's disease

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (November 17, 2008) "Huntington's disease presents an ideal vantage point to study neurodegenerative disease, because we know the misfolded protein that's responsible," says Martin Duennwald, formerly a postdoctoral researcher in the lab of Whitehead Member Susan Lindquist. "But we don't understand how this protein causes cellular damage and death for the neurons that are affected."

DARPA's IBM-Led Neural Network Project Seeks to Imitate Brain

An anonymous reader writes "According to an article in the BBC, IBM will lead an ambitious DARPA-funded project in 'cognitive computing.' According to Dharmendra Modha, the lead scientist on the project, '[t]he key idea of cognitive computing is to engineer mind-like intelligent machines by reverse engineering the structure, dynamics, function and behaviour of the brain.' The article continues, 'IBM will join five US universities in an ambitious effort to integrate what is known from real biological systems with the results of supercomputer simulations of neurons. The team will then aim to produce for the first time an electronic system that behaves as the simulations do. The longer-term goal is to create a system with the level of complexity of a cat's brain.

Ray Kurzweil Wonders Can Machines Ever Have Souls?

Celery writes "There's an interview with Ray Kurzweil on silicon.com talking up the prospects of gene therapy as a means to reverse human aging, discussing different approaches to developing artificial intelligence, and giving his take on whether super intelligent machines could ever have souls. From the interview: 'The soul is a synonym for consciousness... and if we were to consider where consciousness comes from we would have to consider it an emerging property. Brain science is instructive there as we look inside the brain, and we've now looked at it in exquisite detail, you don't see anything that can be identified as a soul — there's just a lot of neurons and they're complicated but there's no consciousness to be seen. Therefore it's an emerging property of a very complex system that can reflect on itself.

Dance Your Way to Fitness and Stress Relief With New DVDs From Razor Fitness: "JENNIFER KRIES: HOT BODY! DANCE" and "JENNIFER KRIES: NEW BODY PILATES 2"

MENLO PARK, CA -- (Marketwire) -- 11/01/08 -- With the popularity of TV shows like, "Dancing with the Stars" and "So You Think You Can Dance," Americans have a renewed interest in dance that is spilling over into the fitness arena. According to a survey published by the American Council on Exercise, health and fitness specialists see dance-based workouts as a growing trend, and Pilates continues to gain in popularity. Besides being fun, dancing continuously for 30 minutes burns 200 to 400 calories per hour -- the same calorie expenditure as experienced when walking, swimming or cycling, according to MayoClinic.com. The coordinated movements of dance also stimulate the brain to create more connections between neurons in the brain, making dance truly beneficial to the mind and body.

Dance Your Way to Fitness and Stress Relief With New DVDs From Razor Fitness: "JENNIFER KRIES: HOT BODY! DANCE" and "JENNIFER KRIES: NEW BODY PILATES 2"

MENLO PARK, CA -- (Marketwire) -- 11/01/08 -- With the popularity of TV shows like, "Dancing with the Stars" and "So You Think You Can Dance," Americans have a renewed interest in dance that is spilling over into the fitness arena. According to a survey published by the American Council on Exercise, health and fitness specialists see dance-based workouts as a growing trend, and Pilates continues to gain in popularity. Besides being fun, dancing continuously for 30 minutes burns 200 to 400 calories per hour -- the same calorie expenditure as experienced when walking, swimming or cycling, according to MayoClinic.com. The coordinated movements of dance also stimulate the brain to create more connections between neurons in the brain, making dance truly beneficial to the mind and body.

Dance Your Way to Fitness and Stress Relief With New DVDs From Razor Fitness: "JENNIFER KRIES: HOT BODY! DANCE" and

MENLO PARK, CA, Nov 01 (MARKET WIRE) -- With the popularity of TV shows like, "Dancing with the Stars" and "So You Think You Can Dance," Americans have a renewed interest in dance that is spilling over into the fitness arena. According to a survey published by the American Council on Exercise, health and fitness specialists see dance-based workouts as a growing trend, and Pilates continues to gain in popularity. Besides being fun, dancing continuously for 30 minutes burns 200 to 400 calories per hour -- the same calorie expenditure as experienced when walking, swimming or cycling, according to MayoClinic.com. The coordinated movements of dance also stimulate the brain to create more connections between neurons in the brain, making dance truly beneficial to the mind and body.

Medical development a work of art that may someday help repair nerve damage

Montreal scientists have developed a laser technique delicate enough to "paint" a picture just one-fifth of a millimetre wide. Some day, your nerves may thank them. Santiago Costantino and his colleagues created an image of the Vermeer painting Girl With a Pearl Earring, pictured, using a laser, but their final goal is medical. Wide as two human hairs, the miniature artwork illustrates the precision they can bring to another task: laying out a path that shows a damaged nerve how to reconnect. "When a nerve is cut, usually humans don't regrow, especially certain nerves like the optic nerve," Mr. Costantino said, noting one reason for this is that people have no way to tell the neurons that constitute these nerves how to find their targets again.

Memory Molecule Identified

Reader Ostracus informs us of research led by Michael Ehlers of Duke University that has identified a molecule, myosin Vb (five-b), that seems to be a critical component in the formation of memory. "A major puzzle for neurobiologists is how the brain can modify one... synapse at a time in a brain cell and not affect the thousands of other connections nearby. Plasticity, the ability of the brain to precisely rearrange the connections between its nerve cells, is the framework for learning and forming memories... The discovery of a molecule that moves new receptors to the synapse so that the neuron... can respond more strongly helps to explain several observations about [brain] plasticity... [The researchers] found that the myosin Vb molecule in hippocampal neurons responded to a flow of calcium ions from the synaptic space by popping up and

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