Brain and mind news and Brain Teasers

Coffee's Aroma Kick-starts Genes In The Brain - Drink coffee to send a wake-up call to the brain? Or just smell its rich, warm aroma? An international group of scientists is reporting some of the first evidence that simply inhaling coffee aroma alters the activity of genes in the brain. June 18, 2008

Aging Is Satisfying, New Research Shows - University of Queensland research is turning conventional wisdom on its head when it comes to grumpy old men and women. June 17, 2008

How The Brain Separates Audio Signals From Noise - How are we able to follow a single conversation in the midst of a crowded and noisy room? Little is known about how the human brain accomplishes the seemingly simple task of extracting meaningful signals from noisy acoustic environments. June 16, 2008

How Cocaine Impairs Fetal Brain Development - Exposure of the developing brain to cocaine can cause neurological and behavioral abnormalities in babies born to mothers who use the drug during pregnancy. June 13, 2008

World's Oldest Woman Had Normal Brain - A 115-year-old woman who remained mentally alert throughout her life had an essentially normal brain, with little or no evidence of Alzheimer's disease, according to a study in the August issue of Neurobiology of Aging. June 12, 2008

Excessive Mobile Phone Use Affects Sleep In Teens - Teenagers who excessively use their cell phone are more prone to disrupted sleep, restlessness, stress and fatigue, according to a research abstract that will be presented on June 9 at SLEEP 2008, the 22nd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS). June 10, 2008

Memory Training Can Increase Intelligence - Can human beings rev up their intelligence quotients, or are they stuck with IQs set by their genes at birth? Until recently, nature seemed to be the clear winner over nurture. June 9, 2008

Are Panic And Inability To Express Emotions Related? - Investigators of the University of Naples have explored the inability to express emotions (alexithymia) in panic disorder. June 6, 2008

Computer Model Reveals How Brain Represents Meaning - Scientists have taken an important step toward understanding how the human brain codes the meanings of words by creating the first computational model that can predict the unique brain activation patterns associated with names for things that you can see, hear, feel, taste or smell. June 3, 2008

Why Cell Phones And Driving Don't Mix - The notion that talking on a cell phone while driving a car isn’t safe seems obvious, yet what happens in the brain while it juggles the two tasks is not. June 2, 2008

Monkey Feeds Itself Using Its Brain - A monkey has successfully fed itself with fluid, well-controlled movements of a human-like robotic arm by using only signals from its brain, researchers from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine report in the journal Nature. May 30, 2008

Vertigo Can Be Treated Easily And Quickly - A new guideline developed by the American Academy of Neurology found that the best treatment for vertigo is the easiest and quickest one. May 27, 2008

Erotic Images Elicit Strong Response From Brain - A new study suggests the brain is quickly turned on and "tuned in" when a person views erotic images. May 23, 2008

Men Experience Domestic Violence, With Health Impact - Domestic violence can happen to men, not only to women, according to Group Health research in the June American Journal of Preventive Medicine. May 21, 2008

Seeing The Brain When We Think Of Others - How do we know what other people are thinking? How do we judge them, and what happens in our brains when we do? May 19, 2008

Discovery Of Cell Linked To Learning And Memory - Queensland Brain Institute (QBI) neuroscientists at The University of Queensland have discovered a fundamental component of the process that regulates memory formation. May 16, 2008

Middle Class Relaxing With Marijuana - A variety of middle-class people are making a conscious but careful choice to use marijuana to enhance their leisure activities, a University of Alberta study shows. May 15, 2008

Genetic Links To Impaired Social Behavior In Autism - Individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) show profound deficits in social interactions and communications, and display repetitive behaviors and abnormal responses to sensory experiences. May 14, 2008

Kids Think Eyeglasses Make Other Kids Look Smart - Young children tend to think that other kids with glasses look smarter than kids who don’t wear glasses, according to a new study. May 13, 2008

Why Emotional Memories Of Traumatic Life Events Are So Persistent - Emotional memories of traumatic life events such as accidents, war experiences or serious illnesses are stored in a particularly robust way by the brain. May 12, 2008

New Link To Schizophrenia Discovered - Neuroscientists at Johns Hopkins have discovered that mice lacking an enzyme that contributes to Alzheimer disease exhibit a number of schizophrenia-like behaviors. May 9, 2008

Does The Brain Control Muscles Or Movements? - One of the major scientific questions about the brain is how it can translate the simple intent to perform an action - say, reach for a glass - into the dynamic, coordinated symphony of muscle movements required for that action. May 8, 2008

Is Bipolar Disorder Overdiagnosed? - A new study by Rhode Island Hospital and Brown University researchers reports that fewer than half the patients previously diagnosed with bipolar disorder received a diagnosis of bipolar disorder based on a comprehensive, psychiatric diagnostic interview - the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV (SCID). May 7, 2008

Brain-training To Improve Memory Boosts Fluid Intelligence - Brain-training efforts designed to improve working memory can also boost scores in general problem-solving ability and improve fluid intelligence, according to new University of Michigan research. May 6, 2008

Weight Loss Possible When Self-belief High - If you are what you eat, what you eat has a lot to do with how you think about yourself, says a QUT PhD researcher whose study is part of an international research project on the healthy ageing of women. May 5, 2008

Hypnosis: The Key To Unlocking The Delusional Mind? - Researchers at Macquarie University have developed an original new approach to the study of delusions, using hypnosis to temporarily create typical delusional beliefs in otherwise non-delusional people. May 1, 2008

Decision Making, Is It All 'Me, Me, Me'? - People act in their own best interests, according to traditional views of how and why we make the decisions that we do. April 29, 2008

Explaining Science Through Drawings - If a picture is worth a thousand words, creating one can have as much value to the illustrator as to the intended audience. April 28, 2008

Psychologists Demonstrate Simplicity Of Working Memory - A mind is a terrible thing to waste, but humans may have even less to work with than previously thought. April 25, 2008

Human Brain Appears 'Hard-wired' For Hierarchy - Human imaging studies have for the first time identified brain circuitry associated with social status, according to researchers at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) of the National Institutes of Health. April 24, 2008

Chemotherapy's Damage To The Brain Detailed - A commonly used chemotherapy drug causes healthy brain cells to die off long after treatment has ended and may be one of the underlying biological causes of the cognitive side effects - or "chemo brain" - that many cancer patients experience. April 23, 2008

Intelligence And Rhythmic Accuracy Go Hand In Hand - People who score high on intelligence tests are also good at keeping time, new Swedish research shows. April 22, 2008

Aerobic Exercise Boosts Older Bodies And Minds - Aerobic exercise could give older adults a boost in brainpower, according to a recent review of studies from the Netherlands. April 21, 2008

Your Belly Fat Could Be Making You Hungrier - The extra fat we carry around our middle could be making us hungrier, so we eat more, which in turn leads to even more belly fat. April 17, 2008

Decision-making May Be Surprisingly Unconscious Activity - Contrary to what most of us would like to believe, decision-making may be a process handled to a large extent by unconscious mental activity. April 16, 2008

Does The Internet Really Influence Suicidal Behavior? - People searching the Internet for information about suicide methods are most likely to come across sites that encourage suicide rather than sites offering help and support, finds a study in the British Medical Journal. April 15, 2008

Mental Health Cultivated On The Farm - Time down on the farm with animals could provide some therapeutic benefit for people with mental illness, according to researchers. April 14, 2008

Just 20 Minutes Of Weekly Housework Boosts Mental Health - Just 20 minutes of any physical activity, including housework, in a week is enough to boost mental health, reveals a large study published ahead of print in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. April 11, 2008

Sleep Problems Common In Children With ADHD - Children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) appear likely to experience sleep problems, according to a new report. April 9, 2008

Brain Damage Can Be Repaired - Scientists in the Laboratoire de Neurobiologie des Processus Adaptatifs have shown that it is possible to repair an injured brain by creating a small number of new, specifically-targeted innervations, rather than a larger number of non-specific connections. April 8, 2008

Brain DNA 'Remodeled' In Alcoholism - Reshaping of the DNA scaffolding that supports and controls the expression of genes in the brain may play a major role in the alcohol withdrawal symptoms, particularly anxiety, that make it so difficult for alcoholics to stop using alcohol. April 7, 2008

Insomnia May Perpetuate Depression In Some Elderly Patients - In addition to being a risk factor for a depressive episode, persistent insomnia may perpetuate the illness in some elderly patients, and especially in those receiving standard care for depression in primary care settings, according to a new study. April 4, 2008

Brain Lesions More Common Than Previously Thought - New research shows cerebral microbleeds, which are lesions in the brain, are more common in people over 60 than previously thought. April 3, 2008

Neurons Hard Wired To Tell Left From Right - It's well known that the left and right sides of the brain differ in many animal species and this is thought to influence cognitive performance and social behaviour. April 2, 2008

How Dangerous Is Boxing For The Brain? - Boxing is possibly less dangerous for the brain than previously feared – at least for amateurs. However, conclusive statements on the level of danger are not yet possible. March 31, 2008

Brain's 'Sixth Sense' For Calories Discovered - The brain can sense the calories in food, independent of the taste mechanism, researchers have found in studies with mice. March 28, 2008

Brain Scientist Shedding Light On Learning, Memory - He had stopped by the lab of a brain researcher at Shanghai’s East China Normal University. The room was dark except for a light shining on the brain. “You could hear this pop, pop, pop, pop,” says Dr. Tsien, brain scientist who recently came to the Medical College of Georgia from Boston University. “At that moment, I got interested in the brain. March 27, 2008

Regulating Negative Emotions And The Impact On Brain Activity - Emotions play an important role in the lives of humans, and influence our behavior, thoughts, decisions, and interactions. The ability to regulate emotions is essential to both mental and physical well-being. March 26, 2008

Fly's Tiny Brain May Hold Huge Human Benefits - Before swatting at one of those pesky flies that come out as the days lengthen and the temperature rises, one should probably think twice. March 25, 2008

Second Depth-Perception Method In Brain Discovered - It's common knowledge that humans and other animals are able to visually judge depth because we have two eyes and the brain compares the images from each. But we can also judge depth with only one eye, and scientists have been searching for how the brain accomplishes that feat. March 24, 2008

Does Stress Damage The Brain? - Individuals who experience military combat obviously endure extreme stress, and this exposure leaves many diagnosed with the psychiatric condition of post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. March 20, 2008

Populations Of Brain Cells Adapt To Changing Images - Neuroscientists studying the mind's ability to process images have completed the first empirical study to demonstrate, using animal models, how populations of nerve cells in visual cortex adapt to changing images. March 18, 2008

Bird Brains Suggest How Vocal Learning Evolved - Though they perch far apart on the avian family tree, birds with the ability to learn songs use similar brain structures to sing their tunes. March 17, 2008

Manic Mouse Made With One Gene Missing - Bipolar Disorder (BPD or manic-depressive illness) is one of the most serious of all mental disorders, affecting millions of individuals worldwide. Affected individuals alternate between states of deep depression and mania. March 14, 2008

Mind Over Body: New Hope For Quadriplegics - Around 2.5 million people worldwide are wheelchair bound because of spinal injuries. Half of them are quadriplegic, paralysed from the neck down. March 13, 2008

The Hand Can't Be Fooled, Study Shows - New research suggests that we process images in two very distinct ways. March 11, 2008

More Than Meets The Ear In Successful Cocktail Party Conversations - Just picture the scene: you're at a cocktail party, talking to someone you would like to get to know better but the background noise is making it hard to concentrate. March 10, 2008

Your Brain On Krispy Kremes: How Hunger Motivates - What makes you suddenly dart into the bakery when you spy chocolate- frosted donuts in the window, though you certainly hadn't planned on indulging? March 7, 2008

Brain Chemistry Ties Anxiety And Alcoholism - Doctors may one day be able to control alcohol addiction by manipulating the molecular events in the brain that underlie anxiety associated with alcohol withdrawal. March 6, 2008

Men Have A Harder Time Forgiving Than Women Do - Forgiveness can be a powerful means to healing, but it does not come naturally for both sexes. Men have a harder time forgiving than women do, according to Case Western Reserve University psychologist Julie Juola Exline. March 4, 2008

Chimps May Have A 'Language-ready' Brain - An area of the brain involved in the planning and production of spoken and signed language in humans plays a similar role in chimpanzee communication, researchers report. March 3, 2008

Researchers Use MRI To Study Spontaneity, Creativity - A pair of Johns Hopkins and government scientists have discovered that when jazz musicians improvise, their brains turn off areas linked to self-censoring and inhibition, and turn on those that let self-expression flow. February 29, 2008

Princeton Researchers Peek Into Deepest Recesses Of Human Brain - A team of scientists from Princeton University has devised a new experimental technique that produces some of the best functional images ever taken of the human brainstem, the most primitive area of the brain. February 28, 2008

Inside The Head Of An Ape - Do apes have imagination? How do they understand pictures? February 26, 2008

Study Shows How Believing Can Be Seeing - Scientists have found the link between what we expect to see, and what our brain tells us we actually saw. February 25, 2008

Good Ideas Distract Groups From Generating Great Ideas - Good ideas can have drawbacks. When information is freely shared, good ideas can stunt innovation by distracting others from pursuing even better ideas, according to Indiana University cognitive scientist Robert Goldstone. February 22, 2008

Scientists Explore Consciousness - An international team of scientists led by a University of Leicester researcher has carried out a scientific study into the realm of consciousness. February 20, 2008

Sex Differences In The Brain's Serotonin System - A new thesis from he Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutet shows that the brain's serotonin system differs between men and women. February 18, 2008

Can People Love The One They Are Compatible With? - Physical attractiveness is important in choosing whom to date. Good looking people are not only popular targets for romantic pursuits, they themselves also tend to flock together with more attractive others. February 15, 2008

Autism Linked Mother's Antibodies - New research from the UC Davis M.I.N.D. Institute and Center for Children's Environmental Health has found that antibodies in the blood of mothers of children with autism bind to fetal brain cells, potentially interrupting healthy brain development. February 14, 2008

More Brain Research Suggests 'Use It Or Lose It' - Queensland Brain Institute (QBI) scientists have found another important clue to why nerve cells die in neurodegenerative diseases, based on studies of the developing brain. February 13, 2008

New Research Explores How Our Bodies Keep Time - Our alarm clocks may spring forward on March 9, but our biological clocks may take longer to adjust. That’s because our internal clocks are so tightly wound to many physiological and behavioral processes. February 12, 2008

Neural Basis Of 'Number Sense' In Young Infants - Behavioral experiments indicate that infants aged 4½ months or older possess an early "number sense" that allows them to detect changes in the number of objects. February 11, 2008

Chronic Pain Harms The Brain - People with unrelenting pain don't only suffer from the non-stop sensation of throbbing pain. They also have trouble sleeping, are often depressed, anxious and even have difficulty making simple decisions. February 7, 2008

Scientists Map Signaling Networks That Control Neuron Function - In the first large-scale proteomics study of its kind, researchers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine have mapped thousands of neuronal proteins to discover how they connect into complex signaling networks that guide neuron function. February 6, 2008

Video Games Activate Reward Regions Of Brain In Men More Than Women - Allan Reiss, MD, and his colleagues have a pretty good idea why your husband or boyfriend can't put down the Halo 3. In a first-of-its-kind imaging study, the Stanford University School of Medicine researchers have shown that the part of the brain that generates rewarding feelings is more activated in men than women during video-game play. February 5, 2008

Daytime Nap Can Benefit A Person's Memory Performance - A brief bout of non-REM sleep (45 minutes) obtained during a daytime nap clearly benefits a person's declarative memory performance, according to a new study. February 4, 2008

Déjà Vu Site In The Brain? - Deep brain stimulation (DBS) surgery, which is used to treat Parkinson's disease and other movement disorders, is now being studied for its potential to treat a variety of conditions. January 31, 2008

Drug Helps Brain Tumor Patients Live Longer - People who receive high doses of the chemotherapy drug methotrexate to treat a certain type of brain tumor appear to live longer than people receiving other treatments. January 30, 2008

Does Mood Matter? What About The Order Of Choices? - Sure, you're more likely to give things a favorable evaluation when you're happy, and a negative evaluation when you're sad. But how does mood influence your choices among items? January 29, 2008

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