TL;DR: A 2026 preprint in medRxiv linked a higher 24-hour urinary sodium-to-potassium ratio with deep white matter lesions on brain MRI in older Japanese adults, with the association appearing to depend more on lower potassium excretion than on sodium alone. Key Findings Urine balance was matched to MRI lesions: The analysis included 296 adults from …
TL;DR: A 2026 study in Communications Medicine reported that artificial intelligence (AI) and multi-contrast MRI post-processing could reveal cortical lesions in multiple sclerosis trial scans that standard MRI review usually misses. Key Findings 80-person methods subset: Researchers analyzed 80 people with primary progressive multiple sclerosis from the phase 3 ORATORIO trial, then trained additional models …
TL;DR: A 2026 Nature Communications study found that chronic tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha), an inflammatory cytokine, pushed human hippocampal progenitor cells toward type I interferon activity, lower neuroblast formation, and CXCR3-dependent T-cell recruitment. Key Findings 0.1-1 ng/ml TNF-alpha: The key experiments used chronic low-dose TNF-alpha exposures that the researchers considered biologically relevant for inflammatory …
TL;DR: A 2026 study in the European Journal of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging reported that adolescent bipolar II depression showed lower thalamic structural-functional connectivity coupling and glucose metabolism than adolescent major depressive disorder in a small exploratory positron emission tomography/MRI (PET/MRI) sample. Key Findings 28 adolescents scanned: The study compared 14 adolescents with bipolar …
TL;DR: A 2026 systematic review and meta-analysis in Journal of Medical Internet Research found that care robots showed a low-certainty reduction in neuropsychiatric symptoms, but six other pooled outcome domains did not reach statistical significance. Key Findings 34 randomized trials: The review included 34 randomized controlled studies across 17 countries, with 2,476 participants. 20 meta-analyzed …
TL;DR: A 2026 preprint in medRxiv reported that frailty and medical comorbidity predicted short-term outcomes more clearly than psychiatric history among older adults evaluated by consultation-liaison psychiatry teams in Spanish general hospitals. Key Findings 465 older inpatients: The prospective OLD-3 cohort included adults aged 65 years and older referred to consultation-liaison psychiatry in 10 Spanish …
TL;DR: A 2026 narrative review in International Journal of General Medicine argued that apathy in Alzheimer’s disease is tied to damage across motivation circuits, including the anterior cingulate cortex, orbitofrontal cortex, striatum, locus coeruleus, and large-scale brain networks. Key Findings Apathy was framed as its own syndrome: The review separates reduced goal-directed behavior from depression, …
TL;DR: A 2026 study in eLife found that infants’ brains responded more strongly to structured children’s music than shuffled music by 3 months, while clearer music-linked movement patterns appeared mainly by 12 months. Key Findings 79 infants tested: Researchers recorded electroencephalography (EEG), a scalp measure of brain electrical activity, and video-based body movement in 3 …
TL;DR: A 2026 mouse study in Nature Communications found that deleting ankyrin-2 (Ank2) from hippocampal astrocytes left recent memory intact but weakened remote memory, pointing to astrocyte structure as part of how memories stay stable over time. Key Findings Recent recall stayed intact: Mice lacking astrocytic Ank2 performed normally in the day-1 contextual fear memory …
TL;DR: A 2026 preprint in medRxiv found that stroke survivors doing motor imagery showed changing brain-heart coupling across rehabilitation sessions, especially between cardiac sympathetic activity and electroencephalography (EEG) beta-band network clustering. Key Findings 15 stroke survivors: Researchers analyzed two cohorts with upper- or lower-limb motor impairment after stroke. 2 motor-imagery protocols: Dataset 1 used gait …
