Parents Refusing the Flu Vaccine

Parents Refusing the Flu Vaccine: "Parents today are of two minds about the new flu vaccine. Some can't wait to get it for their kids, while others remain fearful, writes pediatrician Dr. Perri Klass."

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New Thoughts on Memory

New Thoughts on Memory: "

Traditionally, scientists have believed long-term and short-term memories were formed by different processes within the brain.

This theory is now being challenged by researchers from University College London.

Historically, the position of a different process for memories was based on observation of patients with amnesia, a condition that severely disrupts the ability to form long-lasting memories.

Typically, amnesia is caused by injury to the hippocampi, a pair of brain structures located in the depth of the temporal lobes.

Amnesia, a common side effect of concussions, severely affects long-term memory — although individuals may be proficient in rehearsing a phone number over short periods of time, as long as their attention is not distracted. This led to a hypothesis that the hippocampus supports long-term but not short-term memory.

However, the UCL study, published in PNAS, shows that this distinction now needs to be reconsidered.

The team studied patients with a specific form of epilepsy called ‘temporal lobe epilepsy with bilateral hippocampal sclerosis’, which leads to marked dysfunction of the hippocampi.

They asked the patients to try to memorize photographic images depicting normal scenes, for example chairs and a table in a living-room. Their memory of the image was tested and brain activity recorded using MEG (magnetoencephalography) after a short interval of just five seconds, or a long interval of 60 minutes.

The researchers discovered that short-term memory about more detailed aspects of the scene, for example whether the table was located left or right of the chairs, required the coordinated activity of a network of visual and temporal brain areas, whereas standard short-term memory drew on a very different network. Critically, the coordinated activity of visual and temporal brain areas was disrupted in the patients with hippocampal sclerosis.

Professor Emrah Duzel, UCL Institute for Cognitive Neuroscience, said: “As we anticipated, the patients could not distinguish the studied images from new images after 60 minutes - but performed normally at five seconds. However, a striking deficit emerged even at five seconds when we asked them to recall the detailed arrangement of objects within the scenes.

“These findings identify two distinct short-term memory networks in the brain: one that functions independently of the hippocampus and remains intact in patients with long-term memory deficits and one that is dependent on the hippocampus and is impaired alongside long-term memory.”

Nathan Cashdollar, UCL Institute of Neurology and first author of the paper, added: “Recent behavioral observations had already begun challenging the classical distinction between long-term and short-term memory which has persisted for nearly half a century. However, this is the first functional and anatomical evidence showing which mechanisms are shared between short-term and long-term memory and which are independent.”

“They also highlight that patients with impaired long-term memory have a short-term memory burden to carry in their daily life as well.”

Source: University College London

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Depression Linked to Osteoporosis

Depression Linked to Osteoporosis: "

A new, comprehensive research study has found a strong connection between depression and a loss of bone mass, leading to osteoporosis and fractures.

In a research study consisting of thousands of subjects, Hebrew University of Jerusalem researchers, Prof. Raz Yirmiya, and Prof. Itai Bab, learned that the relationship between depression and bone loss is particularly strong among young women.

According to background information, osteoporosis is the most widespread degenerative disease in the developed world, afflicting 1 in 3 women and 1 in 5 men over 50. Individuals experience decrease in bone density, which often leads to bone fractures. In many cases, these fractures cause severe disability and even death.

Despite the accumulating evidence for a connection between depression and decreased bone density, official authorities, such as the US National Institutes of Health and the World Health Organization, have not yet acknowledged depression as a risk factor for osteoporosis, due to the lack of studies in large samples.

To remedy this situation, the Hebrew University researchers assembled the data from all studies on the subject conducted to date, and analyzed them using a special statistical approach called meta-analysis.

The results were recently reported in the journal Biological Psychiatry. In the article the Hebrew University scientists assessed data from 23 research projects conducted in eight countries, comparing bone density among 2,327 people suffering from depression against 21,141 non-depressed individuals.

The results, say the researchers, show clearly that depressed individuals have a substantially lower bone density than non-depressed people and that depression is associated with a markedly elevated activity of cells that break down bone (osteoclasts).

Yirmiya and Bab found that the association between depression and bone loss was stronger in women than men, especially young women before the end of their monthly period.

This connection was especially strong in women with clinical depression diagnosed by a psychiatrist, but not in community studies, in which women subjectively identified themselves as being depressed using self-rating questionnaires.

Based on the present findings, Profs. Yirmiya and Bab propose that “all individuals psychiatrically diagnosed with major depression are at risk for developing osteoporosis, with depressed young women showing the highest risk.

“These patients should be periodically evaluated for progression of bone loss and signs of osteoporosis, allowing the use of anti-osteoporotic prophylactic and therapeutic treatments.”

Source: Hebrew University of Jerusalem

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How Scents Evoke Memories

How Scents Evoke Memories: "

Have you ever noticed that some smells bring back strong memories? Now, researchers using functional brain imaging techniques have uncovered the scientific basis of memory aromas.

Weizmann Institute scientists posited that the key might not necessarily lie in childhood, but rather in the first time a smell is encountered in the context of a particular object or event.

In other words, the initial association of a smell with an experience will somehow leave a unique and lasting impression in the brain.

To test this idea, the scientists devised an experiment: First, in a special smell laboratory, subjects viewed images of 60 visual objects, each presented simultaneously with either a pleasant or an unpleasant odor generated in a machine called an olfactometer.

Next, the subjects were put in an fMRI scanner to measure their brain activity as they reviewed the images they’d seen and attempted to remember which odor was associated with each. Then, the whole test was repeated – images, odors and fMRI – with the same images, but different odors accompanying each.

Finally, the subjects came back one week later, to be scanned in the fMRI again. They viewed the objects one more time and were asked to recall the odors they associated with them.

The scientists found that after one week, even if the subject recalled both odors equally, the first association revealed a distinctive pattern of brain activity. The effect was seen whether the smell was pleasant or unpleasant.

This unique representation showed up in the hippocampus, a brain structure involved in memory, and in the amygdala, a brain structure involved in emotion. The pattern was so profound, it enabled the scientists to predict which associations would be remembered just by looking at the brain activity within these regions following the initial exposure.

The scientists could look at the fMRI data on the first day of the experiment and predict which associations would come up a week later. To see if other sensory experiences might share this tendency, the scientists repeated the entire experiment using sounds rather than smells; they found that sounds did not arouse a similar distinctive first-time pattern of activity. In other words, these results were specific to the sense of smell.

“For some reason, the first association with smell gets etched into memory,” says Professor Noam Sobel, “and this phenomenon allowed us to predict what would be remembered one week later based on brain activity alone.”

Graduate student Yaara Yeshurun comments: “As far as we know, this phenomenon is unique to smell. Childhood olfactory memories may be special not because childhood is special, but simply because those years may be the first time we associate something with an odor.”

The study is published in the latest issue of Current Biology.

Source: Weizmann Institute of Science

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The Rules of Cancer

The Rules of Cancer: "After a cancer diagnosis, following a few basic rules will help you navigate the health care system."

READ THIS AT THE LINK TO GET THE FULL STORY IT IS QUITE REVEALING ? G

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Adam Christian Business Services: The Arctic will be ice-free in summer within 20 years, research says

Adam Christian Business Services: The Arctic will be ice-free in summer within 20 years, research says

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Adam Christian Business Services: Ace US News Podcasting Couch

Adam Christian Business Services: Ace US News Podcasting Couch

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