Neurobiology

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• *The Deceptive Watchman: How Our Brains Twist Time (1 hr 24 min)
  A second doesn't always feel like a second—time can seem to slow down if you're riding a death-defying roller coaster, or speed up while you're having a night out on the town. But just what's going on inside our heads to skew our perception of time? Neuroscientists Lila Davachi, Dean Buonomano, David Eagleman, and Kia Nobre discuss findings from the latest scientific investigations into the intricacies of our internal clocks in "The Deceptive Watchman," a program in the Big Ideas series at the 2014 World Science Festival. Participants: Lila Davachi, Dean Buonomano, David Eagleman, Kia Nobre Original Program Date: June 1, 2014 John Hockenberry's Introduction. 00:04 A percussive demonstration. 2:40 What is it about time that is elastic in our minds? 10:54 Participant Introductions. 13:00 What kind of clocks are in our brains? 14:16 How does our perception require time? 18:28 How does the brain understand what is now? 21:40 How does memory play into the time in our head? 24:06 The defibrillation simulation test. 32:00 The fear factor of experiments. 38:16 The holiday paradox. 44:00 Physiologically do we add more time than we have? 52:08 Temporal order is needed to explain causality.57:51 The time interruption of Deja Vu. 1:04:20 Is physical reaction time only physical? 1:08:39 Is time forward or backwards? 1:16:23 Are you typically late or on time? 1:21:40
• An atomic view of brain activity
  Published on May 29, 2014
  
  This, in all its molecular complexity, is what the bulging end of a single neuron looks like. A whopping 300,000 proteins come together to form the structure, which is less than a micrometer wide, hundreds of times smaller than a grain of sand. Click the link to find out exactly what's going on throughout the video!
  http://scim.ag/1jxP17a
  Credit: Wilhelm et al. 2014, Science
• Antisocial behavior and brain structure/function
• Assorted notes
• Bruce S. McEwen, Ph.D.
• Cellular Changes Link Stress to Depression
  Rick Nauert PhD, summarizing a presentation at the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology There are about 100 times more glial cells than nerve cells, providing energy and nutrition to the neurons. Besides their ´housekeeping´ functions, glial cells are instrumental to neural communication and regarded as dynamic regulators of synaptic strength and synapse formation. They also possess receptors for neurotransmitters and steroid hormones that, similarly to receptors of neurons, can trigger electrical and biochemical events in the cell. Therefore, structural changes of glial cells are likely to have an important functional significance for the communication between neurons and between neurons and glial cells.
• Circulating cortisol and cognitive and structural brain measures The Framingham Heart Study
  Justin B. Echouffo-Tcheugui, Sarah C. Conner, Jayandra J. Himali, Pauline Maillard, Charles S. DeCarli, Alexa S. Beiser, Ramachandran S. Vasan, Sudha Seshadri First published October 24, 2018, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1212/WNL.0000000000006549 High levels of the hormone cortisol, which the body produces in response to mental and physical stress, are associated with worse memory and visual perception. The study also found an association between higher cortisol levels and multiple areas of microstructural changes in the brain, as well as lower total cerebral brain volume in women. Abstract: Objective:To assess the association of early morning serum cortisol with cognitive performance and brain structural integrity in community-dwelling young and middle-aged adults without dementia. Methods: We evaluated dementia-free Framingham Heart Study (generation 3) participants (mean age 48.5 years, 46.8% men) who underwent cognitive testing for memory, abstract reasoning, visual perception, attention, and executive function (n = 2,231) and brain MRI (n = 2018) to assess total white matter, lobar gray matter, and white matter hyperintensity volumes and fractional anisotropy (FA) measures. We used linear and logistic regression to assess the relations of cortisol (categorized in tertiles, with the middle tertile as referent) to measures of cognition, MRI volumes, presence of covert brain infarcts and cerebral microbleeds, and voxel-based microstructural white matter integrity and gray matter density, adjusting for age, sex, APOE, and vascular risk factors. Results: Higher cortisol (highest tertile vs middle tertile) was associated with worse memory and visual perception, as well as lower total cerebral brain and occipital and frontal lobar gray matter volumes. Higher cortisol was associated with multiple areas of microstructural changes (decreased regional FA), especially in the splenium of corpus callosum and the posterior corona radiata. The association of cortisol with total cerebral brain volume varied by sex (p for interaction = 0.048); higher cortisol was inversely associated with cerebral brain volume in women (p = 0.001) but not in men (p = 0.717). There was no effect modification by the APOE4 genotype of the relations of cortisol and cognition or imaging traits. Conclusion: Higher serum cortisol was associated with lower brain volumes and impaired memory in asymptomatic younger to middle-aged adults, with the association being evident particularly in women.
• Family income, parental education and brain structure in children and adolescents
  Family income, parental education and brain structure in children and adolescents
  Kimberly G Noble, Suzanne M Houston, Natalie H Brito, et al.
  Nature Neuroscience
  (2015) Published online 30 March 2015
• Frans De Waal: “Are We Smart Enough To Know How Smart Animals Are?”
  Diane Rehm Show, May 10, 2016 We humans have long thought of ourselves as superior to animals. We design tools. We have a sense of self. We understand past and future. It turns out, so do other species. A crow in England bent a straight wire to create a hook to extract food from a tube. A study of Asian elephants showed they can recognize themselves in a mirror. And chimps at a Dutch zoo correctly inferred from an empty box that a grapefruit treat was in their future. A new book by the prominent primatologist Frans de Waal challenges our notions of animal intelligence. Join guest host Susan Page for a discussion on how animals are much smarter than we think. Guests Frans de Waal psychology professor at Emory University; author of "Chimpanzee Politics" and "Our Inner Ape"; director of the Living Links Center at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center
• JP Burkett et al. - Oxytocin-dependent consolation behavior in rodents
  Oxytocin-dependent consolation behavior in rodents J. P. Burkett, E. Andari, Z. V. Johnson, D. C. Curry, F. B. M. de Waal, L. J. Young. Science 22 Jan 2016:351(6271):375-378 Abstract: "Consolation behavior toward distressed others is common in humans and great apes, yet our ability to explore the biological mechanisms underlying this behavior is limited by its apparent absence in laboratory animals. Here, we provide empirical evidence that a rodent species, the highly social and monogamous prairie vole (Microtus ochrogaster), greatly increases partner-directed grooming toward familiar conspecifics (but not strangers) that have experienced an unobserved stressor, providing social buffering. Prairie voles also match the fear response, anxiety-related behaviors, and corticosterone increase of the stressed cagemate, suggesting an empathy mechanism. Exposure to the stressed cagemate increases activity in the anterior cingulate cortex, and oxytocin receptor antagonist infused into this region abolishes the partner-directed response, showing conserved neural mechanisms between prairie vole and human."
• Mael Donoso et al. - Foundations of human reasoning in the prefrontal cortex
  Editor's summary: Selecting the most successful strategy
  The brain's prefrontal cortex helps us to make decisions in an uncertain and constantly changing environment. Donoso et al. present a model of human reasoning as an algorithm implemented in the prefrontal cortex (see the Perspective by Hare - http://www.sciencemag.org/content/344/6191/1446.full). Brain-imaging experiments supported this model. Depending on the prevailing circumstances, human reasoning can either adapt ongoing behavioral strategies or switch to previously learned strategies. Only when neither approach is appropriate will the brain create new strategies.
  Science, 27 June 2014;344:1481-
  
• Ming Hsu et al. - Neural Systems Responding to Degrees of Uncertainty in Human Decision-Making
  Neural Systems Responding to Degrees of Uncertainty in Human Decision-Making
  Ming Hsu, Meghana Bhatt, Ralph Adolphs, et al.
  
  Much is known about how people make decisions under varying levels of probability (risk). Less is known about the neural basis of decision-making when probabilities are uncertain because of missing information (ambiguity). In decision theory, ambiguity about probabilities should not affect choices. Using functional brain imaging, we show that the level of ambiguity in choices correlates positively with activation in the amygdala and orbitofrontal cortex, and negatively with a striatal system. Moreover, striatal activity correlates positively with expected reward. Neurological subjects with orbitofrontal lesions were insensitive to the level of ambiguity and risk in behavioral choices. These data suggest a general neural circuit responding to degrees of uncertainty, contrary to decision theory.
  
  Science 9 Dec 2005;310:1680-1683
  
  See also Perspective "Emotion and reason in making decisions", by Aldo Rustichini, p1624
• Neurobiology of impulsive aggression
  Jennifer R. Fanning and Emil F. Coccaro. Chapter 21 (pp316-331) in: The Oxford Handbook of Behavioral Emergencies and Crises. By Phillip M. Kleespies. The fact that aggression has a strong basis in biological factors has long been apparent from case histories of traumatic brain damage. (Google Books preview omits several pages.)
• Neurotechnology and Society: Strengthening Responsible Innovation in Brain Science
  Forum on Neuroscience and Nervous System Disorders Board on Health Sciences Policy The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
• Reports of Pathological Gambling, Hypersexuality, and Compulsive Shopping Associated With Dopamine Receptor Agonist Drugs
  Reports of Pathological Gambling, Hypersexuality, and Compulsive Shopping Associated With Dopamine Receptor Agonist Drugs
  Thomas J. Moore, Joseph Glenmullen, Donald R. Mattison
  
  JAMA Intern Med. Published online October 20, 2014.
• Science Roundup - biology influences behavior, behavior influences biology
  From 1/29/2016 Science Roundup email from the American Association for the Advancement of Science
• Snap Judgment - Switched On
  WUNC-FM, 8/19/2016 John Elder Robison is a writer, speaker and advocate for people with autism. Be sure to check out his neurodiversity work at the College of William and Mary as well as his car restoration work at Robison Services. Producer and Sound Design: Davey Kim
• The Cape Crusader [Ann Aschengrau, environmental epidemiology researcher]
  Barbara Moran, Boston University School of Public Health Epidemiologist Ann Aschengrau has spent 25 years researching toxins in Cape Cod's drinking water.
• The medications that change who we are
  Zaria Gorvett, BBC Future, 8th January 2020
  They’ve been linked to road rage, pathological gambling, and complicated acts of fraud. Some make us less neurotic, and others may even shape our social relationships. It turns out many ordinary medications don’t just affect our bodies – they affect our brains.
• This American Life - 220: Testosterone
  NPR This American Life, 8/30/2002. In the Prologue, producer Alex Blumberg explains that he wanted to do this show because of his conflicted relationship with his own testosterone. He tells host Ira Glass that the reasons go back to a girl in his eighth-grade homeroom and the 1970s seminal feminist novel The Women's Room. We also hear from a man who stopped producing testosterone due to a medical treatment and found that his entire personality was altered. Act One - Life at Zero, Act Two - Infinite gent, Act Three - Contest-osterone, Act Four - Learning to shut up.
• Wiring the altruistic brain
  Sebastian Gluth, Laura Fontanesi Science 04 Mar 2016;351(6277):1028-1029 Research report at http://science.sciencemag.org/content/351/6277/1074
• witch to Standard View Acute Stress Impairs Self-Control in Goal-Directed Choice by Altering Multiple Functional Connections within the Brain’s Decision Circuits
  Silvia U. Maier, Aidan B. Makwana, Todd A. Hare. Neuron. 5 August 2015;87(3):621–631 Summary: Important decisions are often made under stressful circumstances that might compromise self-regulatory behavior. Yet the neural mechanisms by which stress influences self-control choices are unclear. We investigated these mechanisms in human participants who faced self-control dilemmas over food reward while undergoing fMRI following stress. We found that stress increased the influence of immediately rewarding taste attributes on choice and reduced self-control. This choice pattern was accompanied by increased functional connectivity between ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) and amygdala and striatal regions encoding tastiness. Furthermore, stress was associated with reduced connectivity between the vmPFC and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex regions linked to self-control success. Notably, alterations in connectivity pathways could be dissociated by their differential relationships with cortisol and perceived stress. Our results indicate that stress may compromise self-control decisions by both enhancing the impact of immediately rewarding attributes and reducing the efficacy of regions promoting behaviors that are consistent with long-term goals.
• Yuta Aoki et al. - Oxytocin improves behavioural and neural deficits in inferring others’ social emotions in autism
  Oxytocin improves behavioural and neural deficits in inferring others’ social emotions in autism
  Yuta Aoki, Noriaki Yahata, Takamitsu Watanabe, Yosuke Takano, Yuki Kawakubo, Hitoshi Kuwabara, Norichika Iwashiro, Tatsunobu Natsubori, Hideyuki Inoue, Motomu Suga, Hidemasa Takao, Hiroki Sasaki, Wataru Gonoi, Akira Kunimatsu, Kiyoto Kasai, Hidenori Yamasue
  Brain: A Journal of Neurology
  2014;137(11):3073 - 3086