By boosting the activity of cellular ‘power stations’ in the brains of mice with a dementia-like condition, an international team of researchers has reversed pathological memory loss.
Problems with energy-producing cellular structures called mitochondria have previously been linked to neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s. Before now, it wasn’t clear if this was a cause or a consequence of these conditions.
“This work is the first to establish a cause-and-effect link between mitochondrial dysfunction and symptoms related to neurodegenerative diseases, suggesting that impaired mitochondrial activity could be at the origin of the onset of neuronal degeneration,” says Giovanni Marsicano, a neuroscientist from the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research (INSERM).
For decades now, the commonly-accepted view among neuroscientists has been that following amputation of a limb, neighboring regions rearrange and essentially take over the area previously assigned to the now missing limb. This has relied on evidence from studies carried out after amputation, without comparing activity in the brain maps beforehand.
To investigate this contradiction, a team of researchers followed three individuals due to undergo amputation of one of their hands. This is the first time a study has looked at the hand and face maps of individuals both before and after amputation.
The researchers examined the signals from the pre-amputation finger maps and compared them against the maps post-amputation. Analysis of the ‘before’ and ‘after’ images revealed a remarkable consistency: even with their hand now missing, the corresponding brain region activated in an almost identical manner.
The study’s senior author, said: Because of our previous work, we suspected that the brain maps would be largely unchanged, but the extent to which the map of the missing limb remained intact was jaw-dropping.
To complement their findings, the researchers compared their case studies to 26 participants who had had upper limbs amputated, on average 23.5 years beforehand. These individuals showed similar brain representations of the hand and lips to those in their three case studies, suggesting long-term evidence for the stability of hand and lip representations despite amputation.
The brain holds a ‘map’ of the body that remains unchanged even after a limb has been amputated, contrary to the prevailing view that it rearranges itself to compensate for the loss, according to new research.
China initiated its first multi-center clinical trial for brain-computer interface technology in neurocritical care on Sunday, marking a significant expansion of BCI applications beyond the rehabilitation of motor and cognitive functions.
The trial, launched in Tianjin, aims to explore new therapeutic approaches for severe neurological conditions.
Led by the Haihe Laboratory of Brain-Computer Interaction and Human-Machine Integration at Tianjin University and Tianjin Huanhu Hospital, the project brings together leading medical institutions from Beijing, Tianjin, Henan province, and other regions.
“This initiative will pave the way for broader medical applications, offering Chinese technologies, standards, and protocols for precise management of neurocritical conditions,” said Liu Xiuyun, deputy director of the Haihe Laboratory.
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is an autoimmune disease where the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks the central nervous system, leading to the destruction of myelin, the protective sheath surrounding nerve fibres. This damage is a leading cause of neurological disability in young adults.
In the early stages of MS, certain cells possess the capacity to partially repair this damage by generating new myelin. However, this regenerative ability reduces significantly in the later, chronic progressive stage of the disease. This decline in repair contributes to further damage to neurons and increasing disability in individuals with progressive MS.
Despite advancements in treatments, current therapies mostly focus on managing symptoms but do not halt or reverse the damage and neurodegeneration caused. This shows the critical need for a more profound understanding of how MS progresses and to explore how stem cell technologies could help MS treatment.
The study, published in the journal Brain, was spearheaded by University of Cambridge scientist Dr. Luca Peruzzotti-Jametti and offers crucial insights into the potential of neural stem cell transplantation in people with progressive MS. While neural stem cell transplants present a promising avenue for repairing the damaged central nervous system, the limits of their capacity to repair are being investigated by researchers.
(Utilizng stem cells for many innovative treatments is not a question of how, but rather when)
A study led by Cambridge researchers has shed light on how neural stem cell grafts could help restore myelin in the central nervous system. The findings suggest that neural stem cell-based therapies hold promise as a potential treatment for chronic demyelinating disorders, particularly progressive multiple sclerosis.
A research team, led by the Universities of Bristol and Cambridge, demonstrated that the polymer material used to make the artificial heart valve is safe following a six-month test in sheep.
Currently, the 1.5 million patients who need heart valve replacements each year face trade-offs. Mechanical heart valves are durable but require lifelong blood thinners due to a high risk of blood clots, whereas biological valves, made from animal tissue, typically last between eight to 10 years before needing replacement.
The artificial heart valve developed by the researchers is made from SEBS (styrene-block-ethylene/butyleneblock-styrene) – a type of plastic that has excellent durability but does not require blood thinners – and potentially offers the best of both worlds. However, further testing is required before it can be tested in humans.
An artificial heart valve made from a new type of plastic could be a step closer to use in humans, following a successful long-term safety test in animals.
Scientists are making encouraging progress in developing vaccines to treat cancer, but so far the therapies have been restricted to specific types of tumor. Now new research points the way to a universal vaccine that could attack a wider range of cancers.
The research led by a team at the University of Florida focuses on “waking up” the immune system to better respond to more types of cancerous cell – tumors that would otherwise be missed for a variety of reasons.
“What we found is by using a vaccine designed not to target cancer specifically but rather to stimulate a strong immunologic response, we could elicit a very strong anti-cancer reaction,” says neuroscientist Duane Mitchell.
Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a debilitating neurodegenerative disorder that causes progressive memory loss and a decline in mental (i.e., cognitive) abilities. Statistics suggest that between 500,000 and 900,000 people are diagnosed with this disease every year, while several hundreds of thousands experience dementia or other aging-related cognitive decline.
While there are some available treatments designed to delay cognitive decline in individuals with mild or moderate AD symptoms, a cure for the disease has not yet been identified. A better understanding of the neural, genetic, cellular and molecular processes that contribute to the disease’s progression, as well as to neurodegeneration in general, could thus be highly valuable, as it could inform the future development of alternative treatments.
Past neuroscience research has identified the key role of microglia in AD. These are specialized immune cells that monitor the environment in the brain, clearing out damaged cells, debris and pathogens. The dysregulation of these cells has been linked to neurodegeneration and to the progression of AD.