Norepinephrine and Spinning Woman Illusion

The video-based spinning woman illusion (http://flavor8.com/index.php/2007/06/26/spinning-woman-optical-illusion/) has been making the rounds on the internet. Olivia Carter, a neuroscientist at the University of Melbourne in Australia, and her team, found that people's pupils dilate when they switch between two alternative ways of viewing an optical illusion (e.g., the woman seems to switch direction but in fact does not). The effect results from the viewer swapping how they view her. Eye pupils dilate in stressful situations as part of the "fight-or-flight" response. The reflex is mediated by the release of the hormone noradrenalin. Noradrenalin helps you to cement decisions toward which you are moving. Pupil dilation is an outward sign of this.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20527504.000-decisionmakers-betrayed-by-their-wide-eyes.html

Hippocampal Brain Shrinkage

Studies by scientists have led them to believe that wine may be harder on specific areas of the brain, and this effect may be more detrimental to the brains of females. With concerns about Alzheimer's lurking on the horizon, it might be worth your while to evaluate the methods you have been using to manage stress. Wine appears to damage the brain more than beer or spirits, because it particularly affects the hippocampus, a portion of the brain associated with memory and spatial awareness (e.g., "search engine" in the pain-pleasure center and one of the first areas to be impacted by Alzheimer's). The researchers found that wine shrinks the hippocampus and as women tend to drink more wine than beer, they are more likely to be affected


http://www.news-medical.net/news/2008/03/17/36353.aspx

How much can you control rate of aging?

In 1979, Harvard psychologist Ellen Langer carried out an experiment to find if changing thought patterns could slow aging. "Everybody knows in some way that our minds affect our physical being, but I don't think people are aware of just how profound the effect actually is," she says. The results of that ground-breaking experiment have resurfaced and are now being fully revealed. Read about it for yourself! Then think about your habitual thought patterns . . .

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/8498233.stm

Unconscious -- by whose definition?

A report of research studies that was recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), is more than attention-getting! Individuals described as being in a "vegetative state" (described as a persistent lack of awareness following brain injury), may be more aware than previously thought. According to the article, one of the patients was able to correctly answer a series of yes or no questions, his responses interpreted via brain imaging. Whoa! This information may eventually impact the way in which vegetative patients are managed . . .


http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/24475/

Rest to Remember

Researchers at New York University have found that your brain is working for you when you're resting. This means "awake rest" is important for memory and cognitive function, something that many don't seeem to understand with today's round-the-clock activities. According to Lila Davachi, an assistant professor in NYU's Department of Psychology and Center for Neural Science, "Taking a coffee break after class can actually help you retain that information you just learned. Your brain wants you to tune out other tasks so you can tune in to what you just learned."

http://www.physorg.com/news183819123.html

Synapses and Memory

Ever wondered how a memory is created--and lasts? with each other. It's all about"strengthening the synapses." Studies at UCSB's Neuroscience Research Institute have shown that part of the strengthening process involves making new proteins. Those proteins build the synapse and make it stronger. Just like with exercise, when new proteins must build up muscle mass, synapses must also make more protein when recording memories. In this research, the regulation and control of that process was uncovered.

http://www.physorg.com/news180780161.html

Synesthesia Revisited

Is synaesthesia a high-level brain power? That’s the title of an article by Ewen Calloway that was posted by NewScientist. Studies by Jamie Ward and colleagues at the University of Sussex in Brighton, UK, suggest that this phenomenon may be the result of a special ability in the brain areas used for language and attention.

“Earlier, another research group at the Max Planck Institute for Brain Research in Frankfurt, Germany, taught 16 colour-grapheme synaesthetes to equate characters from an ancient Slavic script none had seen before with letters and numerals they already associated with colours. “

(http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427393.800-is-synaesthesia-a-highlevel-brain-power.html).