tagged w/ Brain
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Science says, as revealed in a new Current Biology article; and reiterated in NewsmaxHealth, that the liberal brain is more evolved than the conservative brain. The liberal brain simply has "more gray matter" facilitating the ability to deal with issues of greater complexity, without being unduly disturbed by them or fearful of them. In addition to being restricted to more simple thought processes, the conservative brain tends to respond more fearfully and less flexibly, thereby causing it to cope and adapt less easily to changing world and environmental conditions. They're not evil. They're merely RETARDED! Literally! They're all Henny Pennys! This is why they are so easily duped, manipulated and controlled by the corporate right propaganda. Their innate fear paralyzes them into becoming the ZOMBIE ARMY of the corporate right. This begs the question, then, how do you reason with ZOMBIES? One simply can't, because their reaction to life and events is irrational. It would require a trained therapist to eternally hold their hands throughout life, assuring them that there is nothing to fear, except not meeting the novel challenges which life continuously confronts one with, and which they are not psychologically, optimally equipped to negotiate. Republican groupies, as distinguished from their exploitive corporate right puppet masters, are essentially, and relatively, children who can not ever grow up!
http://www.cell.com/current-biology/abstract/S0960-9822(11)00289-2
http://current.com/11tb24cScience says, as revealed in a new Current Biology article; and reiterated in... more
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In a culture where people cradle their cellphones next to their heads with the same constancy and affection that toddlers hold their security blankets, it was unsettling last month when a study published in The Journal of the American Medical Association indicated that doing so could alter brain activity.
link: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/31/technology/personaltech/31basics.html?_r=1&ref=technologyIn a culture where people cradle their cellphones next to their heads with the same... more
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April 4, 2011
In an interconnected world, speaking more than one language is becoming increasingly common. Approximately one-fifth of Americans speak a non-English language at home, and globally, as many as two-thirds of children are brought up bilingual.
Research suggests that the growing numbers of bilingual speakers may have an advantage that goes beyond communication: It turns out that being bilingual is also good for your brain.
Judy and Paul Szentkiralyi both grew up bilingual in the U.S., speaking Hungarian with their families and English with their peers. When they first started dating, they spoke English with each other.
But they knew they wanted to raise their children speaking both languages, so when things turned serious they did something unusual — they decided to switch to Hungarian.
Today, Hungarian is the primary language the Szentkiralyis use at home. Their two daughters — Hannah, 14, and Julia, 8 — speak both languages fluently, and without any accent. But they both heard only Hungarian from mom and dad until the age of 3 or 4, when they started school.
"When she did go to preschool that accent was very thick – she counted like Vun, two, tree," said Judy Szentkiralyi, recalling Hanna's early experience with English. "And by the time four or five months went by, it was totally gone."
Dispelling Confusion Around Bilingualism
The Szentkiralyis say that most people were supportive, but not everyone. Paul recounts an uncomfortable confrontation Judy once had in the local grocery store.
"I remember one time you came home and you said this one lady was like, 'When is she going to learn English?' And it was like, 'Well, when she goes to school she'll learn English,'" he said.
For a bilingual who really has two good languages that they use, both of them are always active.
- Ellen Bialystok, a psychologist from York University in Toronto
"People would often say, 'Well, won't they get confused?" added Judy. "And I would have to explain, 'Well, no, it wasn't confusing for us.'"
The idea that children exposed to two languages from birth become confused or that they fall behind monolingual children is a common misconception, says Janet Werker, a psychologist at the University of British Columbia who studies language acquisition in bilingual babies.
"Growing up bilingual is just as natural as growing up monolingual," said Werker, whose own research indicates babies of bilingual mothers can distinguish between languages even hours after birth.
"There is absolutely no evidence that bilingual acquisition leads to confusion, and there is no evidence that bilingual acquisition leads to delay," she said.
Werker and other researchers say the evidence to the contrary is actually quite strong. Instead of holding you back, being bilingual, they say, may actually be good for you.
Tuning In To The Right Signal
Ellen Bialystok, a psychologist from York University in Toronto, says the reason lies in the way the bilingual mind uses language.
"We don't really know very much in psychology," said Bialystok. "But the one thing that has been so overwhelmingly proven, that I can say with great certainty, is this: For a bilingual who really has two good languages that they use, both of them are always active."
In other words, no matter what language a person is speaking at the moment, both languages are active in the brain.
"The evidence is very dramatic. Even if you are in a context that is utterly monolingual, where you think there is absolutely no reason to think about Chinese or Spanish or French, it is part of the activated network that's going on in your brain," she said.
More at link..April 4, 2011
In an interconnected world, speaking more than one language is becoming... more
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By KATE MURPHY
Published: March 30, 2011
In a culture where people cradle their cellphones next to their heads with the same constancy and affection that toddlers hold their security blankets, it was unsettling last month when a study published in The Journal of the American Medical Association indicated that doing so could alter brain activity.
The report said it was unclear whether the changes in the brain — an increase in glucose metabolism after using the phone for less than an hour — had any negative health or behavioral effects. But it has many people wondering what they can do to protect themselves short of (gasp) using a landline.
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/03/31/business/BASICS/BASICS-articleLarge.jpgBy KATE MURPHY
Published: March 30, 2011
In a culture where people cradle their... more
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This technology could pave the way for melding minds with machines.Nerve cell tendrils readily thread their way through tiny semiconductor tubes, researchers find, forming a crisscrossed network like vines twining towards the sun. The discovery that offshoots from nascent mouse nerve cells explore the specially designed tubes could lead to tricks for studying nervous system diseases or testing the effects of potential drugs. Such a system may even bring researchers closer to brain-computer interfaces that seamlessly integrate artificial limbs or other prosthetic devices.
LINK : http://news.discovery.com/tech/computer-chips-nerve-cells-110321.htmlThis technology could pave the way for melding minds with machines.Nerve cell tendrils... more
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You may remember the color of your loved one's eyes for years. But how? Scientists believe that long-term potentiation (LTP) -- the long-lasting increase of signals across a connection between brain cells -- underlies our ability to remember
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110320164231.htmYou may remember the color of your loved one's eyes for years. But how?... more
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A California company has recently launched an interesting new product which may signal a major breakthrough in weight loss. The company, SENSA, came up with an innovative way to convince the brain to stop overeating.
link: http://www.howlifeworks.com/a/a/?cid=7190au&AG_ID=520A California company has recently launched an interesting new product which may signal... more
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Controlling Individual Cortical Nerve Cells by Human Thought
Five years ago, neuroscientist Christof Koch of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), neurosurgeon Itzhak Fried of UCLA, and their colleagues discovered that a single neuron in the human brain can function much like a sophisticated computer and recognize people, landmarks, and objects, suggesting that a consistent and explicit code may help transform complex visual representations into long-term and more abstract memories.
Now Koch and Fried, along with former Caltech graduate student and current postdoctoral fellow Moran Cerf, have found that individuals can exert conscious control over the firing of these single neurons—despite the neurons’ location in an area of the brain previously thought inaccessible to conscious control—and, in doing so, manipulate the behavior of an image on a computer screen.
The work, which appears in a paper in the October 28 issue of the journal Nature, shows that “individuals can rapidly, consciously, and voluntarily control neurons deep inside their head,” says Koch, the Lois and Victor Troendle Professor of Cognitive and Behavioral Biology and professor of computation and neural systems at Caltech.
The study was conducted on 12 epilepsy patients at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, where Fried directs the Epilepsy Surgery Program. All of the patients suffered from seizures that could not be controlled by medication. To help localize where their seizures were originating in preparation for possible later surgery, the patients were surgically implanted with electrodes deep within the centers of their brains. Cerf used these electrodes to record the activity, as indicated by spikes on a computer screen, of individual neurons in parts of the medial temporal lobe—a brain region that plays a major role in human memory and emotion.
Prior to recording the activity of the neurons, Cerf interviewed each of the patients to learn about their interests. “I wanted to see what they like—say, the band Guns N’ Roses, the TV show House, and the Red Sox,” he says. Using that information, he created for each patient a data set of around 100 images reflecting the things he or she cares about. The patients then viewed those images, one after another, as Cerf monitored their brain activity to look for the targeted firing of single neurons. “Of 100 pictures, maybe 10 will have a strong correlation to a neuron,” he says. “Those images might represent cached memories—things the patient has recently seen.”
The four most strongly responding neurons, representing four different images, were selected for further investigation. “The goal was to get patients to control things with their minds,” Cerf says. By thinking about the individual images—a picture of Marilyn Monroe, for example—the patients triggered the activity of their corresponding neurons, which was translated first into the movement of a cursor on a computer screen. In this way, patients trained themselves to move that cursor up and down, or even play a computer game.
But, says Cerf, “we wanted to take it one step further than just brain–machine interfaces and tap into the competition for attention between thoughts that race through our mind.”
To do that, the team arranged for a situation in which two concepts competed for dominance in the mind of the patient. “We had patients sit in front of a blank screen and asked them to think of one of the target images,” Cerf explains. As they thought of the image, and the related neuron fired, “we made the image appear on the screen,” he says. That image is the “target.” Then one of the other three images is introduced, to serve as the “distractor.”
“The patient starts with a 50/50 image, a hybrid, representing the ‘marriage’ of the two images,” Cerf says, and then has to make the target image fade in—just using his or her mind—and the distractor fade out. During the tests, the patients came up with their own personal strategies for making the right images appear; some simply thought of the picture, while others repeated the name of the image out loud or focused their gaze on a particular aspect of the image. Regardless of their tactics, the subjects quickly got the hang of the task, and they were successful in around 70 percent of trials.
“The patients clearly found this task to be incredibly fun as they started to feel that they control things in the environment purely with their thought,” says Cerf. “They were highly enthusiastic to try new things and see the boundaries of ‘thoughts’ that still allow them to activate things in the environment.”Controlling Individual Cortical Nerve Cells by Human Thought
Five years ago,... more
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The so-called reward center of the brain may need a new name, say scientists who have shown it responds to good and bad experiences.
link:http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/02/110222121913.htmThe so-called reward center of the brain may need a new name, say scientists who have... more
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Toddler, one of 51 kids using medical cannabis.
Montana has over 28,000 medical cannabis card holders with 51 of them are under the age of 18.
"When I see the number 51 and we're in a state of a million people that's a fraction of a percentage and even with the 28,000 people that are on the program, it's still a fraction not even 1%, so the number is really really small," explained Montana Medical Growers Association Missoula Chapter Director Tayln Lang.
"That's one of the things that I think is one of the biggest misperceptions, is that there's a ton of kids that are out there that have cards that are in high school and junior high, and that are buying this medical cannabis and giving it to their friends and that's just simply not true," Lang added.
The Medical Marijuana Act says in order for children to get a card, they have to follow specific guidelines. It says they "shall issue a registry identification card to a minor if the custodial parent or legal guardian for the minor signs and submits a written statement that the minor's physician has explained the potential risks and benefits of the medical use of marijuana; the custodial parent or legal consents to the medical use of marijuana by the minor; agrees to serve as the minor's caregiver; and agrees to control the acquisition of marijuana and the dosage and frequency of the medical use of marijuana by the minor."
"More often through the children who are under the age of 18 have very very serious medical conditions," said Lang.
One of the state's youngest medical cannabis card holders is Cash Hyde, a 2½-year old boy who battled a brain tumor and won. Cash's dad Michael Hyde says the drug helped Cash with his battle.
"I believe that you know Cashy's with us for a lot of reasons, one of them I would have to say is the power of prayer, one he's a walking miracle and the other one is he is a patient of medical cannabis, which has I think greatly benefited his battle," said Hyde.
Cash's parents were there every step through his battle and watched as drugs prescribed by his doctors made him hallucinate and stop his heart. Cash's dad says medical cannabis helped rebuild his organs that were damaged from the chemo, helped with his appetite, and helped him sleep.
"I watched Cashy not be able to eat for over 40 days, live off nothing but fluid intravenously to the point where he couldn't lift his head up off his pillow, I realized along the way in this journey that there is a quality of life that a lot of people do not have, and it's because of the drugs that they're given," said Hyde.
With medical cannabis so new to many, some are worried of the affect it may have on young developing brains.
Missoula Underage Substance Abuse Prevention Coordinator Brandee Tyree spends her days trying to keep kids away from marijuana.
"The THC will interfere with concentration, learning, problem solving, short term memory, all the things that kids need especially when they're in school and trying to learn. When you have a child that's high at school basically they're not learning so everything they've learned at school is then forgotten because they were high," said Tyree.
"Our coalition is designed to keep kids from using substances illegal or otherwise, alcohol obviously is illegal for kids but not for adults, we still don't want kids using it. Marijuana we take the same stance, it's a substance that's hurtful for the brain during development, we believe it's harmful for kids and in our opinion no we don't think kids should be using marijuana," Tyree added.
Lang asks people to look into the issue before making a decision.
"I would tell people before they make a decision on this to really do their research and check the facts out," Lang told us.
"If you or someone you know has battled cancer I don't have to tell you how devastating it is to watch chemo and cancer consume your loved one and when you can actually watch something that you're doing for them actually benefit them in a way that nobody else can do, you feel empowered you feel like you can make a difference," said Hyde.
Another important fact caregivers would like people to know, is that children card holders are usually ingesting the drug, not smoking it.
They can eat it in baked goods like cookies, cakes, brownies, and muffins. Or they can take a pill or a liquid form of the medicine.Toddler, one of 51 kids using medical cannabis.
Montana has over 28,000 medical... more
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Researchers from the National Institutes of Health have found that less than an hour of cellphone use can speed up brain activity in the area closest to the phone antenna, raising new questions about the health effects of low levels of radiation emitted from cellphones.
:http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/cellphone-use-tied-to-changes-in-brain-activity/?ref=healthResearchers from the National Institutes of Health have found that less than an hour... more
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Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, also known as ME, should be treated with a form of behavioural therapy or exercise, say British scientists.
link :http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-12493009Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, also known as ME, should be treated with a form of... more
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Chase was also born prematurely, and he was legally blind. When he was 1 year old, doctors did an MRI, expecting to find he had a mild case of cerebral palsy. Instead, they discovered he was completely missing his cerebellum -- the part of the brain that controls motor skills, balance and emotions.
"That's when the doctor called and didn't know what to say to us," Britton said in a telephone interview. "No one had ever seen it before. And then we'd go to the neurologists and they'd say, 'That's impossible.' 'He has the MRI of a vegetable,' one of the doctors said to us."
Chase is not a vegetable, leaving doctors bewildered and experts rethinking what they thought they knew about the human brain.
"There are some very bright, specialized people across the country and in Europe that have put their minds to this dilemma and are continuing to do so, and we haven't come up with an answer," Dr. Adre du Plessis, chief of Fetal and Transitional Medicine at Children's National Medical Center in Washington, D.C., told Fox News affiliate WGRZ.
"So it is a mystery."
Chase also is missing his pons, the part of the brain stem that controls basic functions, such as sleeping and breathing. There is only fluid where the cerebellum and pons should be, Britton said.Chase was also born prematurely, and he was legally blind. When he was 1 year old,... more
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Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, also known as ME, should be treated with a form of behavioural therapy or exercise, say British scientists.Writing in The Lancet, they argue that the approach preferred by some charities, managing energy levels, is less successful.
:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-12493009Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, also known as ME, should be treated with a form of... more
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The most common spice turmeric that is familiar to the Indian kitchen can help protect and repair brain cells after stroke.The researchers created a new molecule from curcumin, which is a chemical found in Turmeric.
:http://www.breakingnewsonline.net/health/6896-turmeric-drug-helps-protect-brain-cells-after-stroke.htmlThe most common spice turmeric that is familiar to the Indian kitchen can help protect... more
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Nothing compares to the rush of being newly in love. But even after a decade of marriage or more, some people say their love remains intense.And when these people see pictures of their beloved, found a new study, their brains respond in an area associated with deeply rewarding and motivating feelings -- one of the same areas that lights up in people who are still entangled in the passionate throws of a new relationship.
LINK : http://news.discovery.com/human/valentines-day-love-first-sight-110210.htmlNothing compares to the rush of being newly in love. But even after a decade of... more
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