schizophrenia
NEW YORK - Findings from one of the largest-ever imaging studies of depression indicate that a structural difference in the brain - a thinning of the right hemisphere - appears to be linked to a higher risk for depression, according to new research at Columbia University Medical Center and the New York State Psychiatric Institute.
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- Researchers at MIT's Picower Institute for Learning and Memory have found that inhibiting a key brain enzyme in mice reversed schizophrenia-like symptoms.
It is very hard not to appreciate the necessity of a higher being to the creation and existence of the human brain. Scientists have recently increased study of the relationship between a higher being, God, and the human brain. Why do patients with temporal lobe epilepsy or schizophrenia sometimes report hyper-religiosity, delusions of grandeur, and belief that they are God?
A recent study in Oregon suggests that drugs designed for treating the most severe mental illnesses are often prescribed at inappropriately low doses and at considerable expense, for use in conditions where their benefit has not been established.
Schizophrenia could be caused by faulty signalling in the brain, according to new research published today in the journal Molecular Psychiatry. In the biggest study of its kind, scientists looking in detail at brain samples donated by people with the condition have identified 49 genes that work differently in the brains of schizophrenia patients compared to controls.
Researchers have known for decades that the brain has a remarkable ability to "reprogram" itself to compensate for problems such as traumatic injury.
People with mental illness alone are no more likely than anyone else to commit acts of violence.
Schizophrenia may blur the boundary between internal and external realities by overactivating a brain system that is involved in self-reflection, and thus causing an exaggerated focus on self.
"Picture from Peggy and me (5-07-2008, Bavaria, Germany)"
*Maurits van den Noort received his MA-degree in Social Psychology and Neuro- & Rehabilitation Psychology from the Radboud University Nijmegen (Nijmegen, the Netherlands) and his PhD-degree in Psychology from the University of Bergen (Bergen, Norway). His main areas of interest are: human rights/life aid work, art, science. He is currently working for the Free University of Brussels (Brussels, Belgium) and he is visiting professor at Kyung Hee University (Seoul, Republic of Korea).
Using hairlike microelectrodes and computer analysis, neurobiologists at Duke University Medical Center have demonstrated that they can see the detailed instant-to-instant electrical "brainscape" of neural activity across a living brain. In their study on rats, they demonstrated that they could distinguish in unprecedented detail the patterns of brain activity -- including fleeting changes in communication among brain structures -- in awake animals, as they fall sleep and as they transition among different sleep stages.
''Smart'' drugs capable of targeting specific brain cells to control psychiatric disorders such as autism and schizophrenia may be ready for early clinical trials within three years, with the launch of a $1.5 million project to take place at the Brain Research Centre (BRC), a partnership of the University of British Columbia and Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute (VCHRI). The new drugs would be the first significant change in decades to medications used to treat psychiatric disorders.
An errant enzyme linked to bipolar disorder, in the brain's prefrontal cortex, impairs cognition under stress, an animal study shows. The disturbed thinking, impaired judgment, impulsivity, and distractibility seen in mania, a destructive phase of bipolar disorder, may be traceable to overactivity of protein kinase C, suggests the study. It explains how even mild stress can worsen cognitive symptoms, as occurs in bipolar disoder, which affects two million Americans.
Researchers are using new imaging technology to gather valuable information about the brains of people with schizophrenia. This new variety of magnetic resonance imaging is called diffusion tensor imaging (DTI). Using DTI on patients with schizophrenia, neuropsychologists have related smaller sizes in two distinct webs of brain fibers to two distinct types of cognitive malfunction.
Children of older fathers are more likely to develop schizophrenia in later life, concludes new research in Britain. These findings add weight to the theory that accumulating mutations in the sperm of older fathers contributes to the overall risk of schizophrenia. The study involved over 700,000 people born in Sweden between 1973 and 1980. The analysis was based on records of people admitted to hospital between 1989-2001 with a diagnosis of schizophrenia or other non-affective psychosis.
New research shows that most of the support programs available for family members of schizophrenics are geared towards adults--the siblings, parents, or spouses of individuals with schizophrenia--and the children are overlooked. ''People with schizophrenia can exhibit symptoms such as auditory hallucinations, delusions of paranoia, mood swings, an inability to experience pleasure, an inability to initiate activity, and an inability to show feeling.... The quality of the relationship these individuals have with their children can suffer because of this, but the children often don't understand why and can grow up feeling a lack of warmth, trust, or closeness to their parent.''
