Tag: music and the brain

Weekly Neuroscience Update

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Credit: Cell Metabolism (2023). DOI: 10.1016/j.cmet.2023.02.017

Researchers have found a previously unknown mechanism linking gut bacteria, estradiol, and depression in women. The study, “Gut-microbiome-expressed 3b-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase degrades estradiol and is linked to depression in premenopausal females,” is published in the journal Cell Metabolism.

Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Metabolism Research in Cologne, in collaboration with Yale University, have shown that foods with high fat and sugar content change our brain.

Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) may benefit from early screening and intervention for cardiometabolic conditions according to a meta-analysis of the association between ASD and cardiometabolic conditions in children. Researchers analyzed data from 10 studies and found that children with ASD have a higher risk of developing cardiometabolic conditions such as obesity, hypertension, and dyslipidemia.

Researchers have developed a new wearable technology that records the activity of neurons in the brain as a human walks or moves.

New research published in Human Brain Mapping reveals sex differences and developmental changes in the brain’s white matter in healthy developing infants and 5-year-olds.These findings could help improve our understanding of brain development and potentially inform interventions to support healthy development in children and young adults.

Criteria used by neurologists to assess for multiple sclerosis in adults may fail to identify the illness in children with imaging suspicious for the disease, an oversight that could delay treatment of the disease at its earliest stages.

Elite male soccer players were 1.5 times more likely to develop neurodegenerative disease than population controls, according to an observational study published in The Lancet Public Health journal. The researchers believe that the repeated heading of the ball during practice and games may be a contributing factor to the increased risk of dementia. The findings raise concerns about the long-term health consequences of playing soccer and highlight the need for further research into ways to reduce the risk of dementia in professional athletes.

Using artificial intelligence, researchers have discovered how to screen for genetic mutations in cancerous brain tumors in under 90 seconds.

A common genetic signature has been linked to an increased risk of substance use disorders from smoking addiction to addiction to narcotics. The findings could pave the way to the development of new therapies for substance use disorder and may help diagnose those at risk of multiple substance use disorders.

Finally this week, listening to music may help boost the beneficial effects of medicine while helping to reduce some of the side effects. 

Weekly Neuroscience Update

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Graphical summary of the methodological framework of the study. Credit: Nature Medicine (2023)

The most common type of brain cyst (arachnoid) has no known cause. New research investigating patients with these cysts has found something unexpected—a potential genetic link.

As we age, most of us tend to stop paying attention to new music and stick with the songs from our past. Researchers explored why we narrow our horizons for exploring new music as we age and say listening to new tracks can help create new memory bonds and experience new pleasures.

Adding to the growing body of evidence on sleep disturbances and cognitive impairment, new research finds significant links between three measures of sleep disturbance and the risk for developing dementia over a 10-year period.

A new study confirms that brain development in people with autism differs from those with typical neurodevelopment. According to the study published in PNAS, these differences are linked to genes involved in inflammation, immunity response and neural transmissions. They begin in childhood and evolve across the lifespan.

New research that focused on nutrition and mental health of adolescent athletes found an association between high protein consumption and a decrease in symptoms of depression.

Infants who are born preterm do not habituate to repeated pain the same way in which full-term babies or adults do. Researchers believe this is because preterm infants have not yet developed the mechanism that enables people to adapt to moderate pain, which is thought to develop during the third trimester of pregnancy.

Finally this week, a new study that focused on the nutrition and mental health of adolescent athletes found an association between high protein consumption and a decrease in symptoms of depression.

Weekly Neuroscience Update

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A study of brain function in cosmonauts reveals how the brain’s organization changes after an extended period in space, demonstrating the adaption required to live in a weightless environment.

Researchers are turning to artificial intelligence to find novel drugs that can block kappa opioid receptors with the hope to alleviate opioid addiction. The kappa opioid receptor is a protein in the brain that plays a role in pain management and addiction. When opioids bind to this receptor, it can produce a range of effects, including pain relief, as well as addiction and dependence.

Adults with high levels of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms are more likely to experience anxiety and depression than adults with high levels of autistic traits, according to new research.

Scientists studying sleep difficulties have now published data in Frontiers in Neuroscience that shows that, even in an urban population experiencing disrupted sleep, humans experience longer REM sleep in winter than in summer and less deep sleep in autumn.

Regardless of the game type or length of time a child plays a video game, there is no correlation with a decline in cognitive ability, a new study reports.

Researchers have identified the in-vivo dynamics of synapses that underlie fear memory formation and extinction in the living brain. Fear memory formation and extinction are complex processes that involve changes in the connections between neurons, or synapses, in the brain. Understanding these processes at the level of individual synapses can provide important insights into the neural mechanisms of fear and anxiety disorders.

New research has found that children with conduct disorders exposed to maltreatment showed far more extensive changes in brain structure compared to children with conduct disorders who were not mistreated.

While kleptomania meets the criteria of addiction and is classified as a “Disruptive, Impulse-Control, and Conduct Disorder” by the American Psychiatry Society, few studies of the condition have been published to date. Now a team of researchers has recently found that patients with kleptomania exhibit distinct patterns of gazing and brain activity when shown images with environmental cues relevant to their symptoms. Such characteristics were not observed in healthy subjects.

Finally this week, researchers who examined the relationship between making music and mental health have found that musically active people have, on average, a slightly higher genetic risk for depression and bipolar disorder.

Weekly Neuroscience Update

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Music can induce a range of emotions and help us to better understand different cultures. But what is it that makes us tune in to some songs more than others? Researchers say when we listen to a song, our brains predict what happens next, and that prediction dictates whether we like that song or not.

New research has found significant changes in fathers’ brains between the prenatal and the postpartum period. The main changes occurred in cortical areas associated with visual processing, attention, and empathy toward their baby.

Objective measurement of psychiatric disorders has long proved challenging. Yet, there is ample evidence that analysis of speech patterns can accurately diagnose depression and psychosis, measure their severity, and predict their onset, according to a literature review featured in the January/February issue of the Harvard Review of Psychiatry. 

Alzheimer’s disease onset may be accelerated by viruses that inflame and disrupt signals from the olfactory system to the hippocampus, a new study reports.

As many as one in four patients who receive anesthesia may suffer accidental awareness during their procedure. Researchers have identified specific brain structures that may predict whether a person will experience accidental awareness under anesthesia. The findings will help identify patients who require higher-than-average doses of anesthesia.

A new study aims to investigate the interaction between the digestive and nervous systems, or the gut-brain axis, to discover more about the links between digestive health and neurodegenerative diseases.

Neuroscientists have now shown that two distinct cell populations in the striatum are affected differently by Huntington’s disease. They believe that neurodegeneration of one of these populations leads to motor impairments, while damage to the other population, located in structures called striosomes, may account for the mood disorders that are often seen in the early stages of the disease.

Finally this week, older adults with cognitive decline who have higher levels of vitamin D in their brains had better cognitive function than their peers with lower levels of vitamin D according to a new study.

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A new study explores the use of music-listening to relieve acute pain, finding that people who were given the impression that they had control over the music they heard experienced more pain relief than people who were not given such control.

Better diagnosis and treatment of the incurable eye disease age-related macular degeneration is a step closer, thanks to the discovery of new genetic signatures of the disease.

Research continues to demonstrate the many ways the gut microbiome can influence human health, and an active area within this field centres on its role in Alzheimer’s disease. A new study has furthered our knowledge of this relationship by demonstrating what’s described as a clear genetic link between the two, while also pointing to the potential for new treatments.

Neuroscientists have confirmed that the exact same network is activated in speakers of 45 different languages representing 12 distinct language families.   

Pollution is widely known to be a risk to individual’s physical health, but can it have adverse effects on mental health as well? A study published in Developmental Psychology suggests that exposure to ozone can be a risk factor for depression in adolescents.

Researchers have developed a comprehensive “toolbox” to establish that the mobility of receptors exists in intact brain tissue, and this mobility is critical for certain types of memory.

People challenged with chronic back pain have been given hope with a new treatment that focuses on retraining how the back and the brain communicate, a randomised controlled trial run by researchers at UNSW Sydney and Neuroscience Research Australia (NeuRA) and several other Australian and European universities has shown.

A group of hippocampal neurons show rhythmic activity at different frequencies in the desynchronized state, but can align their rhythmic frequency to produce a synchronized brain rhythm upon activation.

A new hypothesis suggests when people are awake during the biological circadian night there are neurophysiological changes in the brain that alters the way in which we interact with the world, especially when it comes to impulse control, information processing, and reward processing.

Finally this week, you’re fast asleep. But some regions of your brain tasked with hearing sound aren’t taking the night off, according to new research.

Weekly Neuroscience Update

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Can people who understand the emotions of others better interpret emotions conveyed through music? A new study by an international team of researchers suggests the abilities are linked. People who are more accurate at reading another person’s emotions are better able to understand what a musician is trying to convey through their compositions. Additionally, those with higher empathetic accuracy are better able to feel the emotions conveyed through music.

A team of researchers affiliated with several institutions in the U.S. has identified a subtype of brain cells that die in Parkinson’s patients.

Elevated levels of PHGDH in the blood could signal the earliest stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Researchers caution older adults against using “brain-boosting” supplements that contain serine due to its link to PHGDH. As PHGDH is a key enzyme in serine production, elevated PHGDH levels result in increased serine levels in the brain.

A new study examines the role of a brain area called the anterior superior temporal sulcus (aSTS) in forgiving those who make unintentional mistakes.

Using artificial intelligence technology, researchers have identified both risk and protective factors for depression in middle-aged to older adults. Social isolation, the study found, was the biggest risk factor for depression, followed by mobility difficulties and health issues.

Could there be a link between cognitive decline and excessive daytime napping? New research published in Alzheimer’s and Dementia suggests a potential connection.

Stimulating the vagus nerve, which provides a direct link between the gut and brain, makes people pay less attention to sad facial expressions according to new research published in the journal Neuroscience.

A new study reveals a mechanism that appears to reverse the build-up of protein aggregates by refolding them, rather than removing them.

Researchers found idiopathic autism occurs as the result of epigenetic abnormalities in hematopoietic cells during fetal development, leading to immune dysregulation in the brain and gut.

A specific Parkinson’s related gene could be a driver behind vocal production problems associated with the disease. The findings could lead to earlier diagnosis and treatment of Parkinson’s disease.

Finally this week by scanning the brains of 24 people actively suppressing a particular memory, researchers found a neural circuit that detects, inhibits, and eventually erodes intrusive memories.

Weekly Neuroscience Update

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Those who exercise regularly may lower their risk of developing anxiety by 60%, researchers report.

A study published in the journal Sleep shows that a deep neural network model can accurately predict the brain age of healthy patients based on electroencephalogram data recorded during an overnight sleep study, and EEG-predicted brain age indices display unique characteristics within populations with different diseases.

A new study reveals a correlation between instances of eye contact and higher levels of engagement during conversations.

Researchers have developed a deep learning-based method that can predict the possible onset of Alzheimer’s disease from brain images with an accuracy of over 99 per cent. The method was developed while analysing functional MRI images obtained from 138 subjects and performed better in terms of accuracy, sensitivity and specificity than previously developed methods.

Scientists in Japan have identified metabolic compounds within the blood that are associated with dementia.

New research published in Cortex provides evidence that a brain region known as the ventromedial prefrontal cortex contributes to cognitive biases in decision making. People with damage to this area of the brain often experience changes in personality and social behavior. But the new findings suggest that ventromedial prefrontal cortex damage can also make people more rational under some circumstances.

An immunological molecule called fractalkine can boost the production of brain cells that produce myelin, a key factor in diseases such as multiple sclerosis, according to recent research from the University of Alberta.

According to two studies conducted in Serbia during the COVID-19 lockdown, elite athletes and individuals who engaged in vigorous levels of exercise demonstrated the lowest psychological distress during this time. The findings, published in Frontiers in Psychology, further underscored the importance of adaptability, showing that athletes who reduced their training schedules during the early stages of lockdown showed lower distress than those who maintained them.

Finally this week, a new AI algorithm can predict the onset of Alzheimer’s disease with an accuracy of over 99% by analyzing fMRI brain scans.

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New research reveals that neurons in the visual cortex—the part of the brain that processes visual stimuli—change their responses to the same stimulus over time.

Menopause can mess with your memory, and a new study has identified four profiles of cognitive function that may help researchers understand why memory declines for some women and not others. This adds to the mounting evidence of the memory changes that can happen when menopause approaches and could lead to better guidance and treatment for patients experiencing memory issues.

Testing for some inflammatory proteins associated with the nervous and immune systems will help diagnose the earlier onset and progression of Alzheimer’s disease, according to a Rutgers study.

Researchers have recently carried out a study investigating the role of the X-chromosome on human brain anatomy. Their findings, published in a paper in Nature Neuroscience, highlight the key role of the X-chromosome in human neurodevelopment.

A new study explores a new non-dopamine reward circuitry in the brain.

An analysis of data from 1.5 million people has identified 579 locations in the genome associated with a predisposition to different behaviors and disorders related to self-regulation, including addiction and child behavioral problems.

Virtual reality helps to relieve pain and anxiety for children undergoing medical procedures, researchers report.

Scientists have long suspected that religiosity and spirituality could be mapped to specific brain circuits, but the location of those circuits remains unknown. Now, a new study using novel technology and the human connectome, a map of neural connections, has identified a brain circuit that seems to mediate that aspect of our personality.

Finally this week, researchers reveal the neurobiological basis of why we often find it more difficult to find the right words as we age.

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Two new research studies have identified the neural signals underlying music imagery. These neural signals are related to melodic expectations and predictions.

Short naps of up to 60 minutes in duration do not mitigate the effects of a night of sleep deprivation, a new study reports. However, the amount of slow-wave sleep achieved during a nap was related to reduced impairments associated with sleep deprivation.

30% of people reported changes in cognition, memory, and problems with information processing as a result of social isolation caused by pandemic lockdowns.

Some proteins in cells can separate into small droplets like oil droplets in water, but faults in this process may underlie neurodegenerative diseases in the brains of older people. Now, Rutgers researchers have developed a new method to quantify protein droplets involved in these diseases.

A new study reveals how dopamine may have a central role in maintaining our consciousness.

It’s long been known that opioid overdose deaths are caused by disrupted breathing, but the actual mechanism by which these drugs suppress respiration was not understood. Now, a new study by Salk scientists has identified a group of neurons in the brainstem that plays a key role in this process.

A new advanced imaging technique shows how cholesterol regulates the production of Alzheimer’s associated amyloid beta proteins in astrocytes.

A recent experimental study shows how regular physical exercise modulates iron metabolism in both the brain and the muscles. The findings also help to better understand the benefits of exercise in Alzheimer’s disease.

A new AI model can accurately classify a brain tumor of one of six common cancer types from a single MRI brain scan image.

A tiny region in the middle of the brain plays a far more important role than previously known in helping it respond to changes in the environment, a new study shows.

The brain’s white matter pathway organization during the first year of life may predict language acquisition and development at age five, researchers say.

Finally this week, mindfulness may provide modest benefits to cognition, particularly among older adults, finds a new review of evidence.

Weekly Neuroscience Update

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When perceiving rhythm, the brain makes two separate decisions based on grouping and prominence. The groupings mutually inform each other to generate an overall rhythmic perception.

Face pareidolia, a phenomenon where the brain is tricked into seeing human faces in inanimate objects, may occur as a result of the brain processing the perceived facial expression in the same sequential way it perceives a human face. Neuroscientists at the University of Sydney now say how our brains identify and analyse real human faces is conducted by the same cognitive processes that identify illusory faces.

Researchers have identified a novel population of neurons in the temporal pole that links facial perception to long-term memory.

Adults with ADHD are at higher risk of a wide range of physical conditions, including nervous system, respiratory, musculoskeletal, and metabolic diseases, according to a large register-based study from Karolinska Institutet published in The Lancet Psychiatry.

A new study reveals very young infants can perceive objects that older infants, children, and adults can not see due to a phenomenon called visual backward masking.

Infant boys with a gut bacterial composition high in Bacteroidetes were found in a new study to have more advanced cognitive and language skills one year later compared to boys with lower levels of the bacteria. The finding was specific to male children.

Brain cells snap DNA in more places and in more cell types than previously realized in order to express genes for learning and memory.

Researchers have found that a component derived from turmeric essential oil, aromatic turmerone (ar-turmerone), and its derivatives act directly on dopaminergic nerves to create a neuroprotective effect on tissue cultures of a Parkinson’s disease model.

New research shows daydreaming and mind-wandering appear to occur when parts of the brain fall asleep while other areas remain awake.

Finally this week, a diet rich in fermented foods enhances the diversity of gut microbes and decreases molecular signs of inflammation, according to researchers at the Stanford School of Medicine.