Monday, December 16, 2013

By: Bob McGrath
Progressive Thoughts on the Auditory Nervous System
Nina Kraus gave a lecture to my neuroscience seminar class at Loyola University in November about the neurological benefits of playing music particularly with respect to neural-synchronicity. She presented an interesting example where the brain waves recorded with an auditory input resembled, very obviously, the audio sound wave used for the stimulus. Deep Purple's smoke on the water was played for a participant, and the resulting brain waves when converted to an audio file and played back sounded just like smoke on the water. Brilliant!
I have written before about how technology is allowing humans to interface with machines. Most of the research being done has been about Humans transmitting their thoughts to control a computer, but n some instances the researchers are attempting to send control from a computer directly to a brain. Researchers at the university of Washington claim to have created the first human brain to brain communication. On subject was able to send command from his nervous system through a computer to another subject who then responded to the command with a keystroke on the computer. The finger motion was completely elicited by the computer command given by the other subjects brain.
This technology in synthesis with the knowledge that brain waves transcribing auditory information behave in a predictable way could have fascinating implications. With further development this technology could do so much. There are mechanical limits to the ear, and some people hearing is impaired even beyond those limits. With technology that allows transmission of computer data straight into the brain we could bypass the ear entirely. This could work miracles for people with hearing impairment or even provide for super human hearing. As our grasp of the brain's workings improve the possibilities become more and more obviously endless. Who knows? Telepathy could be right around the corner.




Saturday, December 14, 2013

Mozart or no Mozart: Does Music Enhance Cognitive Development?

A recent article published in Science Daily, Muting the Mozart effect, states that the long believed theory that studying music improves intelligence is a myth. Studies conducted by Samuel Mehr, a Harvard graduate student, found no effect of music on the cognitive development of children. (Reuell, 2013) On the other hand, studies done by Nina Kraus found that students who were provided with music training preformed better in school than those who weren’t provided with music training. It seems like there is much more research needed in this area since there are many other studies which suggest both theories could be true.
            The first of Mehr’s studies was conducted using a smaller group of young children. In the study, 29 four-year old children attended 6 classes of musical and visual arts with their parents. The goal of the classes was to encourage parent-child play in context of arts. The children were than assessed in spatial reasoning, numerical discrimination and receptive vocabulary. (Mehr, 2013)
            According to Mehr, neither the results of the first study or the second study (which only consisted of more participants) were significant enough to suggest any correlation between musical training and cognitive development. Mehr believes that their assessment methods were better than a simple IQ test because it tested specific domains of cognition, which would give more accurate results.
            Kraus’s studies were mainly focused on auditory development in musicians versus non-musicians. Her results show that music can be a resource which can train the brain in auditory fitness. (Kraus, 2010) According to Kraus, neuroplasticity achieved by the brain through music training not only improves auditory functions but can help in other areas such as language learning as well.
            I believe Mehr’s studies were too small scaled to measure the effects of music on cognitive development. These studies should focus on children receiving musical training over a much longer period of time rather than just 6 classes of 45 minutes. Kraus’s research of auditory enhancement in long time musicians studies those who have had musical training for a long period of time, which I think is a more accurate study.  I think this area of research deserves more attention and a lot more participants. With the help of schools, the research done in this field can have significant results which can also improve the elementary education system.

Resources:

Kraus, N. and Chandrasekaran, B. “Music training for the development of auditory skills”.  Nature’s Review: Neiroscience. Volume 11 (2010): 599-605. Web. 14 Dec 2013.

Mehr, S. A., Schachner, A., Katz, R.C., and Spelke, E.S. “Two randomized trials provide no consistent evidence for nonmusical cognitive benefits of brief preschool music enrichment”. Plos One. (Dec, 2013). Web. 14 Dec 2013.


Reuell, P. (Dec, 2013). “Muting the Mozart effect.” Science Daily. (Dec, 2013). Web. 14 Dec 2013.

Cognitive Decline Increases with Age

I found a research article called "Memory Research: New Study Outlines how to Delay Cognitive Decline." Currently, we could be facing a dementia epidemic. Dementia is a disease in which there is a great loss of cognitive ability, and it is a disease that is very common in individuals that are sixty-five years of age or older. It is expected that dementia will drastically rise over the next forty years. Since we don have any cure for dementia, it is important to determine if there are some practical ways to delay or stop the onset of dementia. In a research study called "The effects of Mental Activity and Exercise on Cognitive Function in Older Adults Who Self-Report a Recent Decline in Memory or Thinking," the researchers wanted to test how exercise and mental activity affects cognitive function in older and inactive adults who have reported that they have reduced ability in thinking or memory. They hypothesize that combing mental and physical activity will significantly improve the cognitive abilities of senior citizens as compared to performing a mental or physical activity only. One thing that they test is to determine if cognitive function significantly improves at all with exercise and mental activity. Furthermore, if cognitive function increases, they want to determine if performing certain aerobic exercises or intense mental activities like computer exercise had a greater effect towards improving cognitive function than other activities like stretching and watching educational DVDs.

After the study, the researchers found that aerobic and intensive computer simulations do not have the most significant improvement. from the four groups. In the 12 week study, because cognitive scores increased with no significant difference between the intervention and control group, it suggests that the amount of activity (physical/mental) is of more importance that the type of activity.

I found that this article is similar to some of the points in Professor Brann's lecture. Professor Brann discussed some of the scientific causes for cognitive decline. For example, she discussed how aging modulates expression of cell stage proteins. There are fewer GAP-43 proteins in older animals than younger animals, and there is more OMP in aged animals vs. young animals. Fewer cells have made a fate decision in older animals. She also found that in young animals, growth associated proliferation in VNE decreases with age. She observed the CE region and saw that proliferation in VNE decreases with age. She also saw that proliferation in MOE decreases with age, regardless of zone. Thus, proliferation declines with age in normal animals.

I feel that there is a connection between Professor Brann's article and the journal article that I found, because while Professor Brann goes into greater detail of the causes of cognitive decline, the article I found discusses a study that shows how we can slow the process of cognitive decline.

The article that I found can be found here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/03/memory-research_n_3003587.html


Friday, December 13, 2013

The Long-Term Effects of Alcohol Consumption During Periods of Development

As alcohol abuse becomes more and more prevalent in today’s high schools, it is important to know what these adolescents are risking as they binge-drink. A study conducted at the Stritch School of Medicine (Loyola University Chicago) in 2011 showed the long-term effects of binge-pattern alcohol exposure on the HPA axis, which functions in regulating stress. Researchers used juvenile male Wistar rats to test their hypothesis that binge-pattern alcohol exposure would have a long-lasting and detrimental effect on the development of the HPA axis. The rats were treated with either saline alone for eight days or a binge-pattern alcohol treatment. Then, they were allowed to grow into adulthood undisturbed. Once they reached adulthood, the rats were treated a second time with either saline alone, a single dose of alcohol, or another round of the binge-pattern alcohol treatment.
Results showed that the adults who had been exposed to a binge-pattern of alcohol during the juvenile stage had permanent alterations of the HPA axis. Specifically, the HPA axis became more sensitive to the future exposures to alcohol. Furthermore, the ability to adjust to recurring stressors was jeopardized. Essentially, adults who were exposed to binge-drinking during puberty experience more stress when drinking in adulthood and have more difficulty getting used to the stress caused by alcohol exposure. This has been linked to the development of mood disorders, but there haven’t been studies done to investigate that any further.
Puberty is one critical period in development. Another critical period that has shown long-term effects of alcohol exposure is the prenatal period. A study conducted at the University of Pittsburgh in 2012 showed the effects of prenatal alcohol exposure behavioral problems in 22-year-olds. This was a longitudinal study which interviewed mothers during their fourth and seventh month of pregnancy, as well as at delivery. Additionally, the researchers followed the children, seeing them at 8 months, 18 months, and 3, 6, 10, 14, 16, and 22 years. The mothers that had exposed their children to alcohol prenatally across the entire term had children who showed more behavioral problems at age 22. In this case, binge drinking did not predict more problems when compared to general exposure throughout the term. Additionally, no trimester was safe for the mother to be drinking.

Overall, exposure to alcohol at the critical periods in development is detrimental to proper development of the brain. It’s not shocking to find out that a mother drinking during pregnancy will have negative long-term effects on her child. However, people tend to think that the effects are minimal as they grow older. The first study has clearly shown us that this is not the case. The brain is constantly developing, especially at puberty. Unfortunately, this has become the time when many adolescents are starting to drink alcohol and particularly binge-drink with friends. The effects here are not just in the present, potentially ruining an adolescent’s athletic standing or academic record, they are long-term, affecting brain development. This is a far greater cost than people realize. 

Risks of Alcohol Consumption in Today’s Youth

        As we know, adolescence is a critical period during human development as it represents an individual’s mental and physiological transition from childhood into adulthood. Unfortunately, the vast amount of growth and development that characterizes this phase of life is often hindered by excessive drug and alcohol abuse that is heavily idealized and marketed in today’s society, especially to youth. According to a 2011 study conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 21.91% of high school students surveyed admitted to having had five or more drinks of alcohol in a two-hour period—which is often the amount used in identifying alcoholism—within 30 days of taking the survey. Despite this prevalence of alcohol abuse in youth, little research has yielded significant results regarding the long-term neurobiological consequences of binge drinking at such a young age. Earlier in the semester, Dr. Magdalena Szymanska from the Department of Physiology at Loyola University Chicago’s Stritch School of Medicine presented her research on the effects of excessive alcohol consumption in adolescents, namely how this consumption affects the responsiveness of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis which plays a role in regulating blood hormone levels.
            For her research, Dr. Szymanska used a rodent model to simulate adolescent binge drinking. The experimental rats were treated with volumes of alcohol with the same duration and frequency that would qualify as binge-drinking in adolescents. Control rats were treated with the same duration and frequency but with saline treatments instead. These treatments were given during puberty and then the rats were given a separate treatment of alcohol or saline during adulthood. In order to measure the effects of the alcohol consumption on the HPA axis, levels of hormones such as corticotrophin-releasing hormone (CRH), arginine vasopressin (AVP), and corticosterone (CORT) were measured before and after treatment. They essentially found that binge-pattern alcohol consumption during adolescence resulted in dysregulation of the HPA axis which can have significant implications on the adult stress response. Disruption of the stress response can result in mood disorders amongst other conditions in adolescents that can easily be avoided if adolescents are hindered from such extreme levels of alcohol consumption.

            Another condition that is of great concern for adolescents is attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Unlike alcohol consumption in adolescents, numerous studies have been conducted to find an association between various adolescent behaviors such as playing video games and ADHD diagnosis. Stimulant medications such as Adderall and Ritalin are often prescribed to treat adolescents with this condition. Despite these readily available treatment options, parents are often hesitant about these prescriptions because they do not want their children to develop a dependency on pharmaceuticals at such a young age. Interestingly, one article published earlier this year in The New York Times mentioned a study that was done to see if there was a relationship between this type of stimulant drug use to treat ADHD and later drug and alcohol abuse. According to the article, parents’ fears about their children taking these prescription medications were often eased by physicians and pharmaceutical companies citing previous studies that claimed that stimulant medications such as Adderall and Ritalin reduce the risk of these adolescents engaging in other substance abuse later in life. However, the study cited by The New York Times article disproved this finding and actually found that there is no relationship between stimulant medication use in adolescents and subsequent substance abuse. Thus, these prescription medications do not increase or decrease adolescent susceptibility to binge-drinking behavior yet more and more adolescents continue to be diagnosed—and often misdiagnosed—with ADHD and prescribed these medications as though they were both treating ADHD and preventing possible alcoholism in the future. If anything, it seems to me that these prescriptions are being used as an unconventional marketing strategy for the prevention of drug and alcohol abuse in young people. Perhaps a more effective and less dangerous prevention strategy would be to continue encouraging the work of researchers such as Dr. Szymanska in their pursuit of knowledge regarding the long-term neurobiological and developmental consequences of alcohol consumption in the younger members of society. Further knowledge of this sort can lead to further education of these adolescents so they can have a stronger understanding of how their decisions to drink might have lasting effects on their growth and development. This will then hopefully encourage them to make better, well-informed decisions regarding their health and reduce such harmful behaviors in our youth to allow for a brighter future.      

Works Cited:
Przybycien-Szymanska, Magdalena, Natasha Mott, Caitlin Paul, Roberta Gillespie, and Toni Pak. "Binge-Pattern Alcohol Exposure during Puberty Induces Long-Term Changes in HPA Axis Reactivity." Plos One. 6.4 (2011): 1-7. Web. 13 Dec. 2013.

Schwarz, Alan. "No Link Seen Between Child Stimulant Use and Later Drug Abuse." New York Times 29 05 2013, n. pag. Web. 13 Dec. 2013. <http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/30/health/no-impact-found-for-stimulants-on-later-drug-abuse.html?_r=0>.

"Youth Online: High School YRBS." . Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Web. 13 Dec 2013. <http: / / apps.nccd.cdc.gov / youthonline / App / Results.aspx?TT=&OUT=&SID=HS&QID=H43&LID=&YID=&LID2=&YID2=&COL=&ROW1=&ROW2=&HT=&LCT=&FS=&FR=&FG=&FSL=&FRL=&FGL=&PV=&TST=&C1=&C2=&QP=G&DP=&VA=CI&CS=Y&SYID=&EYID=&SC=&SO=>.

Psychopathy as a Benefit and its Potential Predictors in Children




Within all the stigma that commonly surrounds psychopathy, a recent shining exception appeared in the news: psychopaths are more successful than the average person. Individuals often accuse politicians of having marred charm, a lack of remorse, ability to persuade and control others, and a large sense of self worth. Little do they know that these are the hallmarks of psychopathy. Indeed psychopathy isn't restrained to a subset of the population always hunted down the law, it's present in some doctors, lawyers, world leaders, and business owners; it is clear that although a person may be a psychopath, that person isn't necessarily violent. Traits such as fearlessness, attention, and mental grit are translated into an advantage over other individuals working the same job. In an excerpt from "What Psychopaths Teach Us about How to Succeed", Kevin Dutton discusses a study done using a self-reporting Psychopathy scale and an customs exercise where subjects were told to identify the individual that's hiding a scarlet cloth. The individuals that scored higher on the Psychopathy scale consecutively were able to hone in accurately on the individuals that had the red cloth. This is because psychopathic in dividuals are capable of detecting weakness in other people and take advantage of that more so than the average person. In a related study, "Kids with Conduct Problems May Have Brains that Under-React to Painful Images: May Increase Risk of Adult Psychopathy", it was discovered that kids that are prone to callous behavior in the classroom have reduced brain response to tasks that call upon empathy. One such task was demonstrated in the article by Kevin Dutton that involves analysis of responses from the amygdala and the prefrontal cortex when an individual is presented with two scenarios. One scenario involved whether the individual would push a lever to alter the path of a train car to kill one person rather than 5 people on the tracks. The other scenario, one that activates the emotional center (the amygdala) in average people was whether the individual would push a large person in front of the train car if it would stop the train car at the expense of the large person's life. A psychopathic individual would answer the second scenario without much emotional conflict, they would clearly, rationally see that they would exchange one life for five. However, an average individual would struggle with taking one life through their own direct influence (pushing) even if five people would be saved. The presence of similar communications in the brain of a child could potentially be diagnostic of psychopathy. In the world of tomorrow, we might be able to prevent crime and rehabilitate individuals that exhibit a violent brand of psychopathy.

Works Cited:
Dutton, Kevin. "What Psychopaths Teach Us about How to Succeed [Excerpt]: Scientific American." What Psychopaths Teach Us about How to Succeed [Excerpt]: Scientific American. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Dec. 2013. <http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=what-psychopaths-teach-us-about-how-to-succeed&page=2>.
Lockwood, Patricia L, and Catherine L Sebastian. "Kids With Conduct Problems May Have Brains That Under-React to Painful Images: May Increase Risk of Adult Psychopathy." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 2 May 2013. Web. 13 Dec. 2013. <http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/05/130502131859.htm>.

So You Want a Baby Genius...



Being the runt of my friend group as well as the nerdiest of the bunch, a slew of nicknames has fallen upon me throughout college a favorite being: fetus genius. As hilarious as the term seems a new study has hit news media recently that could make the term a little bit more realistic. The New York Times reported on November 20, 2013 that a mother’s exercise might actually boost fetal development of their child’s brain. 

Studies concerning the effect of exercise on cognition have been done and continue to be done on people and animals of all ages. In his neuroscience talk at Loyola University Chicago, neuroscientist Art Kramer explained to students some of the studies his lab has done that have shown the benefits exercise has on cognition of both adults and children. Kramer explained that in animal as well as human studies there have been clear connections drawn between exercise and cognition. Exercise positively impacts functional connectivity as well as executive function of the brain. Fitness interventions show increased brain volume, increased neurogenesis of the hippocampus and increased white matter integrity.  In children, relational memory is impacted by activity level and high fit kids show much better multi-tasking abilities than low fit kids. Kramer assured us that there doesn’t seem to be a point of no return when it comes to exercise benefits on cognition; even older adults with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease who have not been physically active in the past can benefit cognitively from exercise.  

While Kramer explained there doesn’t seem to be an upper limit, this new study seems to answer whether there are lower limits on how early these cognitive effects due to exercise begin to take place. Studies have been conducted on new born children of mothers that completed at least three, twenty minute work outs a week showed higher brain activity in response to novel sounds than children born to mothers that did not exercise. The researchers hypothesize that the same chemicals that impact the adult’s cognitive function due to exercise travel to the fetus as well and have a similar impact on the brain. 

The studies done thus far have only begun to scratch the surface of the outcome of pregnant mothers that exercise. More research needs to be conducted to determine the long term effects of this exercise on their children. However, as of now it is clear that just an hour of exercise a week can impact the cognitive development of a fetus. It seems you can never start too early and there’s no such thing as too late.

Resources:

Reynolds, Gretchen. "Mother’s Exercise May Boost Baby’s Brain." Well Mothers Exercise May Boost Babys Brain Comments. N.p., 11 Nov. 2013. Web. 14 Dec. 2013. <http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/11/20/mothers-exercise-may-boost-babys-brain/?_r=1>.
Kramer, Art. "Physical Activity and Exercise Effects on the Brain and Cognition." Illinois, Chicago. 20 Nov. 2013. Lecture.

Stem Cells, The Possibilities Are Endless


      Stem cell research has earned a lot of stigma since their emergence into the medical field as possible vehicles for cures to different types of diseases. However, in more recent news, specifically on October 8, 2012, the New York Times published an article that gave recognition to two scientists who won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine based on their research in cloning and stem cells. The scientific community has come a long way to finally be awarded such a prestigious honor in research that has always been viewed negatively in society due to ethical and religious views. "Dr. Gurdon was the first to clone an animal" and "Dr. Yamanaka discovered" proteins that converted adult cells to an egg like state (Wade, Cloning and Stem Cell Work Earns Nobel). The two recipients John Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka have been conducting research in their respective fields for many years. Dr. Yamanaka, specifically, has been conducting research into figuring out what genes can convert adult cells to pluripotent stem cells, called "induced pluripotent cells" (Wade, Cloning and Stem Cell Work Earns Nobel). In 2006, Dr. Yamanaka found 4 genes that can be inserted into the adult cell nucleus that change the cell into a egg like cell, which can now act as a stem cell and can be manipulated to different types of tissues. The vast amount of treatment possibilities with stem cells attracts researchers worldwide and steps taken by researchers such as Dr. Gurdon and Dr. Yamanaka prove that advancement will benefit humanity.

      Recently, Loyola's own, Professor Jessica Brann presented her research in neural stem cell regeneration, specifically in the olfactory system. Stem cells are localized in two regions of the brain, hippocampal and olfactory epithelium. Prof Brann is interested in trying to find the regenerative capacity of these olfactory epithelium neural stem cells in aged animals. To determine if the regenerative capacity of the stem cells was intact in aged animals, injury, such as removing a part of the of the olfactory bulb, was induced. Results were obtained to see if the stem cells were regenerated, and they were. Prof Brann's research is quite interesting because the possibility of neural stem cells was not always addressed in aged animals, only the young. By focusing in aged systems, the research on stem cells can apply to neural degenerative diseases like Alzheimer's that appears among the elderly.  These neural stem cells can easily be isolated and manipulated and invite many possibilities for clinical applications. Prof Brann's investigation into neural stem cell regeneration and proliferation in adult aged animals can provide very important clues as to how to approach the problems of neurological diseases.

    The advancements that are being made in both neural stem cell research and stem cell research is astonishing and the results are very promising. With the diversity of stem cells, the possibility for a cure is close at hand. Diseases where tissues are ravaged can become cured in the near future with the aid of stem cells. By taking leaps towards a better future, researchers and scientists invested in stem cell research are advancing the intellect necessary to solve problems like diseases. The possibilities again, are endless.

Works Cited:

Wade. "Cloning and Stem Cell Work Earns Nobel." New York Times, October 8, 2012.

http://brannlab.weebly.com/research.html


Optogenetics –The revolutionary method that allows scientists to investigate the relationship between neuronal activity and behavior in freely moving organisms

       Optogenetics is the relatively novel method that allows for direct investigation of the relationship between neuronal activity of specific neuronal populations and animal behavior.  
Before we discuss what kind of findings can be achieved with this method, we must review the basic concepts underlying optogenetics. For those who have doubts about the creativity of scientists, this method is a clear proof that being a scientist involves much innovation and creativity. As one could easily guess from the name, optogenetics combines genetics and optics, and permits direct targeting of cells of interest. The whole technique became possible with the discovery of opsin channels – channels sensitive to light-present in a multitude of microbes, the animal version of the channel, rhodopsin, is present in the eye and allows for vision.  A relevant type of opsin channel to optogenetics is Chanelrhodopsin (ChR2). This channel has similar structure and function to other channels present in the brain, and when light is shown upon a neuron that expresses ChR2, the channels open and allow cations to flow in the cell, producing depolarization.  
     The genetics part of this method implies that genetic manipulations must be made so that ChR2 can be expressed in the neurons of interest. A special genetic component must be expressed in the target neurons, presence of Cre recombinase- a doublefloxed inverted open-reading-frame in the target neurons allows for the gene that codes for ChR2 to be expressed in the neurons. Transgenic animals were created that express Cre in specific neuronal populations, then a viral injection (adenno associated viral vector-AAV) that carries the genetic information for ChR2 is made in the target area- the result is an animal that expresses light sensitive channels in a particular area of the brain.
     The optic part of the optogenetics involves a means to deliver light to the target tissue. In order to achieve this goal, optic fiber cannulas are implanted in the brain area of interest. These cannulas are fixed chronically on the skull of the animal. When performing a behavioral experiment, the cannulas are connected to a patch cable that delivers light from a laser delivery device at a certain wavelength. The light then is sensed by the channelrhodopsin present in the neurons, triggering a response in the cell, and consequently a behavioral response.
      Optogenetics might seem a bit complicated, yet the applications of this method allow for studies that were not possible before.Dr. Stephan Steidl, professor of Psychology at Loyola University Chicago, uses optogenetics to study the relationship between the inputs to the ventral tegmental area (VTA) of the brain and the motivational behavior in mice. Projections of the dopamine neurons in VTA to limbic and cortical areas such as the nucleus accumbens (NAc) and prefrontal cortex (PFC) of the brain have been identified to have a significant role in behaviors that involve motivation, reward and cognition (Omelchenko et al., 2005).  Predominant brain disorders such as addiction and depression, involve pathological dysfunction in the performance of this task (Lammel et al., 2012).  The VTA also receives inputs from other parts of the brain, and these inputs are thought to influence the activity of the dopamine neurons, thus affecting reward behavior. Dr. Steidl’s studies focus on the inputs to the VTA coming from the laterodorsal tegmental area (LDTg) and the pedunculopontine tegmental area (PPTg). With the help of optogenetics, he is able to study the individual effects of three different types of neurotransmitters released by these areas on the VTA, and consequently their effects on reward behavior.  Thus, insight can be gathered about the mechanisms of the too common addictive behaviors we observe in humans. Optogenetics is a rather innovative and efficient way to study such specific functions in the brain.
    Optogenetics is also used to study the underlying causes of schizophrenia, brain disorder in which people have distorted perception of reality, symptoms include hallucinations, delusions, disordered thinking and behavior.  Researchers at the University of California in San Francisco, Elizabeth Steinberg and Ronald Keiflin used rats as animal model to study the role of dopamine neurons in prediction error learning.  Role that is thought to be malfunctioning in schizophrenic patients. With the help of optogenics, the researchers manipulated the activity of dopamine neurons during behavioral learning experiments.  Findings of this study suggest that stimulation of dopamine neurons at certain times may modify the learning from prediction errors and could also successfully mimic a prediction error, resulting in an enduring impact on reward-seeking behavior. These findings reveal the importance of dopamine release at specific times in reward seeking behavior and offer direction for therapies development to treat the symptoms of schizophrenia. 


    The applications of optogenics confer a revolutionary means to study the brain and its intricate circuitry. Hope for new treatments also arises with the use of this new method. Thus we all should be grateful for the creativity of scientists!

Sources:

Fenno L, Yizhar O., Deisseroth K.,The Development and Application of Optogenetics Annual Review of Neuroscience, Vol. 34, No. 1. (2011), pp. 389-412, 

Lammel S. et al, Input specific control of reward and aversion in the ventral tegmental area, Nature, Vol 491, Nov. 2012

Omelchenko N. and Sesack S., Laterodorsal tegmental projections to identified cell populations in the rat ventral tegmental area, The Journal of Comparative Neurology, 483:217-235, 2005

Schizophrenia Research Forum, Surprise Signals: Optogenetics Links Dopamine to Prediction Errors, Steinberg EE, Keiflin R, Boivin JR, Witten IB, Deisseroth K, Janak PH. A causal link between prediction errors, dopamine neurons and learning. Nat Neurosci. 2013 May, 26 http://www.schizophreniaforum.org/pap/annotation.asp?powID=169761

Steidl, Stephan -Lecture          

Stem Cells to the Rescue

Stem cells are undifferentiated cells capable to turning in to a wide number of cells, and stem cells offer science a chance to replicate these cells into whatever cell type they are interested in studying.  In neuroscience, stem cells are used for research about neurons. A huge part of stem cell neuronal research is in studying the properties of neural degenerative disorders.  Stem cells are giving science hope that one day dying, faulty, or diseased neurons can be replaced with the help of neurons. Stem cells can be differentiated based on the environments that they are cultured in and the nutrients present.  Scientists are able to easily differentiate neurons which opens up many avenues in studying the properties neurons- but learning how to use these neurons may advance understanding in neurological disease.

Dr. Hui Ye of Loyola University research is now centered around stem cell galvanotaxis which is movement of an organism or any of its parts in a particular direction in response to electric field .  Dr. Ye is addressing a a major issue in stem cell research involving neurons by the use of applied physics.  After generating new neurons for replacement therapy scientists have struggled in manipulating new neurons to migrate to injury sites where previous neurons have been damaged or died.  It is a huge feat for stem cells to make a full transformation into a neuron and for a neuron to be transplanted into an injured host for therapy purposes. The ability to create a neuron allows for the possibilities of curing degenerative diseases, illness, and injury... but without the ability to control the migration of newly formed neurons in a host, science cannot achieve  replacement of diseased neurons with new neurons without the ability to freely guide neurons.

Dr. Ye's approach to studying stem cells involved collecting a cell culture of stem cells from young animals and recording cellular voltage changes using whole cell recording, in which an electrode is injected into a cell to read its electrical state.  By using a charge strip with negative and positive ends, cells via galvanotaxis migrate from the positive to the negative end.  Dr. Ye is just beginning to understand how galvanotaxis causes cells to migrate, but his hypothesis is that migration of stem cells in the presence of an electric field may be due to calcium. Dr. Ye's work shedding light on ways in which scientists and the medical field might one day be able to guide new neurons to repair injury and prevent neuronal degeneration.

Research approaches to using stem cells in neuroscience vary and all help scientists to further their understanding on the works of the brain especially in neuro-degenerative disease. One fascinating use of stem cells to hit the science news circuit via Scientific American is the use of stem cells to grow a "mini-brain."  This brain is more like a clump of neuronal tissue, but because of the right mixture of nutrients and nudges science was able to create a brain prototype.  News like this shows how versatile stem cells can be and how useful they are in studying.  In particular, studying a "mini-brain" can shed much insight into learning about degenerative diseases and how they arrive and in what ways might be useful for treatment and prevention. It was a huge surprise and a success to have something of this magnitude in stem cell research to work! 

Cross-section of "mini-brain" grown from human stem cells


The approach to "growing brains" is still in its early phases, but like all scientific research early stages are key to future successes.  Stem-cell derived mini-brains lack the physiological aspects of a live brain, but ultimately the tissue clumps can be used for further studies .  The fall backs in this research are ultimately a stepping stone to see where and how far stem cells can take scientists in understanding the the causes and cures to neurological diseases.

Work like Dr. Hui Ye's and the scientists who created the "mini-brain" are just examples of the many researches in the neuroscience and biology field harnessing the power of stem cells to gain insight into neurological diseases.  The path difference between the two methods show how diverse this field of research is and how young stem cell research is and how far stem cell research will grow in the years to come. 

Link to News Article:  http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=stem-cells-mimic-human-brain



How Do We Fix That Spinal Cord Injury? A Look At Navigating Stem Cells Through Scar Tissue

            Stem cells have become a topic of much debate, both good and bad, within the medical and scientific field. With the start of the new millennium came great new insights into what stem cells are and how they function. The Human Genome Project, completed in 2003, only further developed scientific understanding of DNA, genes, and ultimately stem cells. Many scientists are working to discover the potential of these cells, especially their therapeutic potential. Dr. Hui Ye of Loyola University Chicago is one such scientist who is looking to take these cells and make use of them in the central nervous system (CNS). As a neurobiology professor, he is interested in taking these stem cells and moving them with an electric field so that they migrate to a target area in the body, a process called galvanotaxis. Particularly, he is looking at spinal cord injuries and how to target specific areas of the injury with these stem cells so that the cells can migrate to that area, settle, and differentiate into the desired cell, either neurons or glia. Dr. Ye is hoping that the magnetic field will generate a movement of these cells that is specific and not random as is observable when the stem cells are injected to the target site without being given any particular direction.
            Dr. Ye's former work with rats proved to be somewhat successful by injecting stem cells into an injured spinal cord in order to form oligodendrocytes. These glial cells form myelin sheaths around the neurons that assist in the neuron's conduction of action potentials. Although the injection did help somewhat, the final placement of these cells where not exactly where his research group had hoped the neural precursor cells (NPCs) would settle. The difficulty of getting these cells to go where they should go for the greatest therapeutic effect is caused by scar tissue that builds up and surrounds the injured spot of the spinal cord. This scar tissue is mainly made up of astrocytes, a type of glial cell that performs many functions in the CNS such as providing nutrients to the nervous tissue or maintaining the extracellular ion balance. These astrocytes also play a role in the repair and scarring process after traumatic injury to either the brain or the spinal card by rapidly dividing and filling up the injured site. These glial cells cannot produce action potentials of their own so once these cells produce scar tissue, neurons have difficulty passing signals along to other neurons on the other side of the scar tissue. Also, neurons cannot regrow within the scar tissue preventing the reformation of connections where there were connections before an injury. This scar tissue ultimately prevented the stem cells injected into the rat spinal cords from reaching that area that Dr. Ye's research group was targeting.
            Through the use of galvanotaxis Dr. Ye hopes to be able to navigate the stem cells through the scar tissue and accurately place the stem cells in the correct position so that they can differentiate into whatever cells are necessary to restore connections between neurons, and eventually restore the organism's ability to move. Dr. Ye hopes to discover with his current research whether the cell's movement in an electric field is due to the stem cell's surface charge or the movement of calcium into and out of the cell that promotes actin depolymerization and polymerization respectively (breakdown and growth of cellular molecules that provide structure within the cell), or both! He also hopes to use different conditions in the solution that the stem cells sit in to determine how they will affect the movement of the cells. Such conditions include using different pH levels, using alternating current (AC) instead of direct current (DC) and using calcium channel blockers. The calcium channel blockers should also provide an answer as to whether or not the movement of calcium is what causes the movement of the stem cells in the electric field.
            While navigating through astrocytes is one of Dr. Ye's goals, an article titled "Stem Cell Scarring Aids Recovery from Spinal Cord Injury" from ScienceDaily presents research that claims stem cells already in the spinal cord that normally differentiate into scar tissue could potentially be stimulated to become other cells that could restore function. This research group from Karolinska Institutet in Sweden wanted to see if blocking scar tissue formation by preventing the spinal cord stem cells from forming into scar tissue cells would allow neural regeneration to occur without being blocked. Nevertheless, what they discovered was the complete opposite! By blocking scar tissue formation, what resulted was a gradual expansion of the injury site and more nerves fibres were severed. What they observed in the mice was that mice with blocked stem cell function had more dead nerve cells in the spinal cord than those mice who had normal stem cell function. Thus, it turns out that scar tissue is necessary to prevent further injury to the spinal cord because the scarring "'facilitate[s] the survival of damaged nerve cells'". The researchers determined that more scar tissue limits the consequences of injury. Like Dr. Ye's work, this group acknowledges that injecting stem cells into the site of injury can be beneficial, but they also suggest that stimulation of the spinal cord's own stem cells may provide an alternative that Dr. Ye is not looking at. The stem cells would already be within the injured area, but as to whether or not they would need to be navigated a little to be in the correct position is still unclear. In addition, the next difficulty lies in how to get these stem cells to differentiate into the desired cells once they are in the correct location.

Source:

Karolinska Institutet. "Stem cell scarring aids recovery from spinal cord injury." ScienceDaily,      31 Oct.     2013. Web. 10 Dec. 2013.
Neurobiological Associations of Political Ideologies

            Within the last decade, neuroscientific researchers have broken the boundaries of the traditional neuroscience field, venturing into the unfamiliar territory of political neuroscience. Political neuroscience is a budding area of research investigating the neurological basis of political thought. The field essentially hopes to answer the questions: why are conservatives conservative, and why are liberals liberal? While the scientific literature is still developing, studies conducted thus far are coming to the conclusion that we may indeed be hardwired for our political ideologies and candidacy loyalties.

           A recent article published in Science Daily reports a political neuroscience research study conducted at the University of South Carolina that explored the possibility of a connection between the neural network of social connectedness and political self-identities. The study used MRI scans to view the brains of 24 USC students. The researchers focused on the brain’s mirror neuron system, a neurological network involved in social connectedness. Interestingly enough, for those participants who identified themselves as liberal, the researchers found greater activity in regions associated with “broad social connectedness,” such as friends and the greater world. The neural activity of conservatives suggested “tight social connectedness,” including family and country. The researchers of this study believe that the differences in neural activity that they found in conservatives and liberals may help to explain why conservatives tend to be oriented more towards America, and liberals more towards the globe.

            Dane Wendell, a political science graduate student at Loyola University Chicago, is currently conducting his own political neuroscience research at Loyola’s Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Laboratory. In a recent neuroscience talk Wendell gave at the university, Wendell discussed his fascination for the extent to which conservatives and liberals become so passionate about their political ideologies when engaged in debate with an opposing viewpoint. Wendell explained that for whatever reason, the beliefs and values that conservatives and liberals hold seem to cluster within two distinct poles- those held by liberals, and those held by conservatives. In other words, the presence of one political attitude tends to be associated with another political attitude. Wendell hopes to be able provide a neurological reason as to why the ideological clustering of the two political poles leads to such fundamental disagreements.            

            Wendell’s research uses electroencephalography (EEG) to investigate differences in regional electrical activity of the brains of self-identified conservatives and liberals. Like the study previously cited, Wendell based his research on the stark personality differences that we tend to encounter in the two political groups. Specifically, conservatives are known to have aversive personality styles, meaning that they tend to avoid threatening or dangerous outcomes. Based on these differences, Wendell uses the “Go/No-Go” task, a task believed to measure the brain’s Behavioral Inhibition System (BIS), the neurological network responsible for making inhibitory actions against negative outcomes. Conservatives, having aversive personalities, should perform better on the task than liberals. Wendell’s results, however, do no indicate any robust differences between conservatives’ and liberals’ neurological activity in their behavioral inhibition systems. Wendell believes that the lack of neurological differences he found may be due to a misinterpretation of the “Go/No-Go” task, which other researchers argue may be more of a measure of cognitive flexibility. 

            Research within the political neuroscience field is still in the process of forming the foundation about what we know concerning the neurobiological basis of political ideologies. Definitive answers have yet to be formed, but research is clearly on its way towards explaining why people identify themselves as conservative or liberal.

References

University of South Carolina. “This is your brain on politics: Neuroscience reveals brain
differences between Republicans and Democrats.” Science Daily, 1 Nov. 2012. Web 12
Dec. 2013.
Wendell, Dane. Neuroscience Seminar. Loyola University Chicago. Chicago, IL. 29 Oct. 2013.
Lecture.