Serotonin And Happiness Are Regulated By Gut Bacteria - BMED Report University of College Cork (UCC) scientists have shown that brain levels of serotonin, the ‘happy hormone,’ are regulated by the amount of bacteria in the gut during early life. Their research is being published today in the leading international psychiatry journal, Molecular Psychiatry. This research shows that normal adult brain function depends on the presence of gut microbes during development. Serotonin, the major chemical involved in the regulation of mood and emotion, is altered in times of stress, anxiety and depression and most clinically effective antidepressant drugs work by targeting this neurochemical. Scientists at the Alimentary Pharmabiotic Centre in UCC used a germ-free mouse model to show that the absence of bacteria during early life significantly affected serotonin concentrations in the brain in adulthood. The research also highlighted that the influence is sex dependent, with more marked effects in male compared with female animals.
Neuroacoustics: The Healing Power of Sound ALBUQUERQUE, NM—The experience of sound is at the very core of human consciousness, and it can be a powerful tool for healing, said Jeffrey Thompson, DC, at the annual meeting of the American Holistic Medical Association. For more than 20 years, Dr. Thompson has been exploring neuroacoustics and the therapeutic application of sound. His researches have led to the development of precise protocols for using sound to modulate brainwave patterns, affect sympathetic-parasympathetic balance, and synchronize the activity of the right and left brain hemispheres. He has applied these methods in stress reduction, cardiovascular disease prevention, management of depression, and a host of other conditions. “It is akin to the picking of a lock on the neurophysiologic processes that the body already uses to heal itself,” said Dr. Primordial Sounds and Self-Awareness Perception of sound begins in the womb, and it begins very early. Physical Resonance Much of Dr. Dr. In 1973, Dr. Dr. A Healer’s Journey
Neurological disorder MMF found to be caused by vaccines: scientific proof (NaturalNews) It is a little-known condition that can trigger persistent and debilitating symptoms similar to those associated with multiple sclerosis (MS) and fibromyalgia, but is also one that the medical profession at large is still unwilling to acknowledge. And yet emerging research continues to show that macrophagic myofasciitis, or MMF, is a very real condition brought about as a direct result of vaccines that contain aluminum adjuvants, which become lodged in muscle tissue and lead to severe neurological damage and other problems. First identified in 1998, MMF is characterized by debilitating muscle and joint pain, chronic inflammation, and incapacitating fatigue. Though clearly distinct from both fibromyalgia and MS, which are also now believed by many to be neurological conditions triggered by vaccines, MMF is similar in that it appears to involve the demyelination of the central nervous system, or the loss of the fatty layer myelin sheaths that protect nerves.
Revista chilena de nutrición - ACIDOS GRASOS OMEGA-3, ENFERMEDADES PSIQUIÁTRICAS Y NEURODEGENERATIVAS: UN NUEVO ENFOQUE PREVENTIVO Y TERAPÉUTICO Rev Chil Nutr Vol. 36, N°4, Diciembre 2009, págs.: 1120-1128 Rodrigo Valenzuela B. (1), Karla Bascuñan G. (1), Alfonso Valenzuela B. (2), Rodrigo Chamorro M. (3) (1) Escuela de Nutrición y Dietética, Facultad de Medicina Universidad de Chile. Santiago, Chile. (2) Centro de Lípidos, Instituto de Nutrición y Tecnología de los Alimentos, INTA, Universidad de Chile. Dirección para correspondencia Psychiatric depression and neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease and multiple sclerosis, have shown a considerable increase in recent decades, particularly in Western countries. Key words: Omega-3 fatty acids, neurodegenerative diseases, nutrition and disease prevention. Las enfermedades psiquiátricas y neurodegenerativas han experimentado un considerable incremento en las últimas décadas, particularmente en los países de occidente, destacando entre las de origen psiquiátrico la depresión y entre las neurodegenerativas la esclerosis múltiple y la enfermedad de Alzheimer.
Your Memories Need Their Sleep Ann Whitman (212) 223-4040awhitman@dana.org The big test is tomorrow—should you stay up late and study, or cut short the cram session and get a good night’s sleep? Most if not all students face this dilemma at some point in their lives. Until very recently, their choice might have seemed obvious: stay up and study, to commit as much information to memory as possible. But research now indicates that missing sleep in order to study may well be self-defeating. This issue doesn’t affect only students or business people whose performance depends heavily on memorization. The good news is that researchers may soon find ways to counteract this process, by helping people to sleep better and by developing techniques to strengthen specific memories during sleep. A recent awakeningThere have long been tantalizing hints of the relationship between sleep and memory. But testing the relationship between sleep and memory was and still is tricky. Sleep itself is not a uniform process.
Changing brains: why neuroscience is ending the Prozac era | Science | The Observer Mice are used in research into optogenetics, which suggests that even finer control of the brain may be possible. Photograph: John B Carnett/Popular Science via Getty Images The psychiatric drug age may have reached its peak. Although mind-altering medications are being prescribed in record numbers, signs of a radically new approach to understanding and treating mental illness are emerging from the deep waters of neuroscience. The starkest indication that drugs are increasingly being thought of as yesterday's cutting-edge comes from the little mentioned fact that almost all the major drug companies have closed or curtailed their drug discovery programmes for mental and neurological disorders. This is largely because these drugs tend not to be very specific in their effects on the brain. In its place is a science focused on understanding the brain as a series of networks, each of which supports a different aspect of our experience and behaviour. Big money has already been committed.
Neuroscientists reveal magicians' secrets - Technology & science - Science - LiveScience NEW YORK — There is a place for magic in science. Five years ago, on a trip to Las Vegas, neuroscientists Stephen Macknik and Susana Martinez-Conde realized that a partnership was in order with a profession that has an older and more intuitive understanding of how the human brain works. Magicians, it seems, have an advantage over neuroscientists. "Scientists have only studied cognitive illusions for a few decades. Magicians have studied them for hundreds, if not thousands, of years," Martinez-Conde told the audience during a recent presentation here at the New York Academy of Sciences. [ Video: Your Brain on Magic ] She and Macknik, her husband, use illusions as a tool to study how the brain works. After their epiphany in Las Vegas, where they were preparing for a conference on consciousness, the duo, who both direct laboratories at the Barrow Neurological Institute in Arizona, teamed up with magicians to learn just how they harness the foibles of our brains. Most popular
Grandma's Experiences Leave Epigenetic Mark on Your Genes Why can’t your friend “just get over” her upbringing by an angry, distant mother? Why can’t she “just snap out of it”? The reason may well be due to methyl groups that were added in childhood to genes in her brain, thereby handcuffing her mood to feelings of fear and despair. Of course, it is generally not possible to sample the brains of living people. All the men had been at a socioeconomic extreme, either very rich or very poor, at some point in their lives ranging from early childhood to mid-adulthood. Timing, in other words, matters. Last year, Szyf and researchers from Yale University published another study of human blood samples, comparing 14 children raised in Russian orphanages with 14 other Russian children raised by their biological parents. A case study in the epigenetic effects of upbringing in humans can be seen in the life of Szyf’s and Meaney’s onetime collaborator, Frances Champagne. The Mark Of Cain
Direct and indirect cellular effects of aspa... [Eur J Clin Nutr. 2008 Viral obesity: fact or fiction? [Obes Rev. 2010]