TL;DR: A 35-year-old woman with 20 years of seizures that medicines could not control became seizure-free after surgery removed a small fluid-filled cyst and the nearby part of her brain where seizures started. It is one case, so it cannot prove the cyst caused her epilepsy. Key Findings Seizures since age 15: Up to 2 …
TL;DR: Researchers rebuilt 10-second movie clips that mice had watched, using only recordings from about 8,000 neurons in each mouse’s visual cortex. The blurry, low-resolution results matched the originals fairly well, but this is not mind reading. Key Findings 50 clips rebuilt: Ten 10-second movies from each of 5 mice. Pixel match of 0.57: About …
TL;DR: Brain scans of 48 women with borderline personality disorder showed less gray matter in the insula and parts of the frontal lobe than in 54 women without it. Some of those frontal areas were more strongly in sync with other brain regions, and that syncing was linked to symptom severity, self-harm and childhood trauma. …
TL;DR: In rats trained to spot a brief flash of light, a drug that blocks one nicotine-type receptor (alpha-7) made them better at telling flash from no flash, even with distractions. Drugs that boosted the same receptor made them worse at high doses. Key Findings Alpha-7 blocker helped: Moderate doses of MLA improved detection, mostly …
TL;DR: In a small Polish trial of 22 children aged 6 to 9 with coordination problems, coordination exercises with and without moves that cross the body’s center line both improved movement planning and two-sided coordination. Final scores were about the same in both groups. Key Findings 22 children finished: Out of 32 who started, split …
TL;DR: Alzheimer’s-model mice fed very salty chow for 6 months had altered gut bacteria, more brain inflammation and plaques, and more anxious behavior than mice on normal chow. It’s a mouse study, and the gut-to-brain link was not proven. Key Findings 8% vs 0.4% salt for 6 months: Male Alzheimer’s-model mice, about 40 per diet …
TL;DR: In a 40-person stroke rehab trial, people who did video-game balance training with a tight cuff on the weak thigh improved balance, walking and leg strength more over 4 weeks than people doing the same training without the cuff. The trial was small, short and had no fake-cuff comparison. Key Findings 40 stroke patients, …
TL;DR: Mouse studies of spinal muscular atrophy have reported anywhere from no loss to 60% loss of motor neurons, and a German-American team found that which slice of spinal cord gets counted explains much of that spread. Counting the right segments with a reliable stain gave clearer pictures of three mouse models. Key Findings 75 …
TL;DR: A Swedish study of 42 people with depression found no link between the brain’s main calming chemical, GABA, and slowed movement, early waking or poor appetite. The researchers measured GABA with two kinds of scans, but most patients had fairly mild versions of these symptoms. Key Findings No link with slowed movement: Neither observer …
TL;DR: In 86 people from one hospital in China, those with Parkinson’s and mild thinking problems showed changes in how water moves through parts of the hippocampus, a memory center. The hippocampus was not measurably smaller, suggesting a diffusion scan may pick up changes that size alone misses. Key Findings No size difference: None of …
