In recent years, a growing body of evidence shows that photons play an
important role in the basic functioning of cells. Most of this evidence
comes from turning the lights off and counting the number of photons
that cells produce. It turns out, much to many people's surprise, that
many cells, perhaps even most, emit light as they work. Various work suggests that neurons emit and even conduct photons. Could it be that biophotons help to synchronise the brain?
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Apr 1, 2012
Transforming Scar Tissue Into Beating Hearts
The latest research developments to reprogram scar tissue resulting from
myocardial infarction (MI) into viable heart muscle cells, were
presented at the Frontiers in CardioVascular Biology (FCVB) 2012
meeting, held 30 March to 1 April at the South Kensington Campus of
Imperial College in London.
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Feb 25, 2012
New automated tomography imaging process speeds up whole-brain mapping
Serial Two-Photon Tomography (STP tomography), a new technology developed by neuroscientists at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and MIT, significantly speeds up the process of acquiring highly detailed anatomical images of whole brains. Until now, the process has been painstakingly slow and available only to a handful of highly specialized research teams.
STP tomography achieves high-throughput fluorescence imaging of whole mouse brains via robotic integration of the two fundamental steps — tissue sectioning and fluorescence imaging. At 10x magnification of brain tissue samples, the researchers were able to achieve fast imaging at a resolution sufficient to visualize the distribution and morphology of green-fluorescent protein-labeled neurons, including their dendrites and axons, Osten reports.
[ more ] [ paper ]
STP tomography achieves high-throughput fluorescence imaging of whole mouse brains via robotic integration of the two fundamental steps — tissue sectioning and fluorescence imaging. At 10x magnification of brain tissue samples, the researchers were able to achieve fast imaging at a resolution sufficient to visualize the distribution and morphology of green-fluorescent protein-labeled neurons, including their dendrites and axons, Osten reports.
[ more ] [ paper ]
Feb 20, 2012
Decoding brain activity to identify imagined speech
Neuroscientists at University of California, Berkeley have succeeded in decoding electrical activity in the brain’s temporal lobe — the seat of the auditory system — as a person listens to normal conversation. Brain activity was recorded using implanted electrode array. Based on this correlation between sound and brain activity, they then were able to predict the words the person had heard solely from the temporal lobe activity.
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Feb 19, 2012
Getting the measure of MRI
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The Mystery Behind Anesthesia
Mapping how our neural circuits change under the influence of anesthesia could shed light on one of neuroscience's most perplexing riddles: consciousness.
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Jan 13, 2012
The Pill That Could Cure Depression by Growing Your Brain
If you are depressed, or schizophrenic or have Alzheimer's, scientists say you probably have a shrunken hippocampus. The good news: a drug that just entered human trials promises to re-grow that part of the brain.
It's an entirely new approach to treating clinical depression, which is the first of several diseases scientists at biotech company Neuralstem are hoping to address with their experimental oral drug. Most antidepressants work on brain chemistry, tweaking levels of neurotransmitters including serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine. This is the first drug that aims to re-grow patients' atrophied brains.
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It's an entirely new approach to treating clinical depression, which is the first of several diseases scientists at biotech company Neuralstem are hoping to address with their experimental oral drug. Most antidepressants work on brain chemistry, tweaking levels of neurotransmitters including serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine. This is the first drug that aims to re-grow patients' atrophied brains.
[ more ]
Dec 4, 2011
Physiological Parameter Monitoring from Optical Recordings with a Mobile Phone
Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) researchers have developed a smart phone app that can measure heart rhythm and rate, respiration rate, and blood oxygen saturation using the phone’s built-in video camera.
As the camera’s light penetrates the skin, it reflects off pulsing blood in the finger. The app can correlate subtle shifts in the color of the reflected light with changes in the patient’s vital signs. Measurement of respiratory rate uses an algorithm developed for use with a pulse-oximeter, based on amplitude and frequency modulation sequences within the light signal.
Ref.: Scully, C. et al., Physiological Parameter Monitoring from Optical Recordings with a Mobile Phone,IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, 2011; [DOI: 10.1109/TBME.2011.2163157]
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As the camera’s light penetrates the skin, it reflects off pulsing blood in the finger. The app can correlate subtle shifts in the color of the reflected light with changes in the patient’s vital signs. Measurement of respiratory rate uses an algorithm developed for use with a pulse-oximeter, based on amplitude and frequency modulation sequences within the light signal.
Ref.: Scully, C. et al., Physiological Parameter Monitoring from Optical Recordings with a Mobile Phone,IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, 2011; [DOI: 10.1109/TBME.2011.2163157]
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New ‘smart’ material could help tap medical potential of tissue-penetrating light
Scientists at the University of California, San Diego Skaggs School Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences report development and successful initial testing of the first practical “smart” material to use a form of light that can penetrate four inches into the human body, for use in diagnosing diseases and engineering new human tissues in the lab.
They used near-infrared (NIR) light (just beyond what humans can see), which penetrates through the skin and almost four inches into the body. Low-power NIR does not damage body tissues. However, current NIR-responsive smart materials require high-power NIR light, which could damage cells and tissues.
They developed a new smart polymer (plastic). Hit with low-power NIR, the material breaks apart into small pieces that appear to be nontoxic to surrounding tissue. They could put the polymer in an implantable hydrogel, which is a water-containing flexible material used for tissue engineering and drug delivery. A hydrogel with the new polymer could release medications or imaging agents when hit with NIR. “To the best of our knowledge, this is the first example of a polymeric material capable of disassembly into small molecules in response to harmless levels of irradiation,” say the researchers.
Ref.: Nadezda Fomina, et al., Low Power, Biologically Benign NIR Light Triggers Polymer Disassembly, Macromolecules, 2011; 44 (21): 8590 [DOI: 10.1021/ma201850q]
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They developed a new smart polymer (plastic). Hit with low-power NIR, the material breaks apart into small pieces that appear to be nontoxic to surrounding tissue. They could put the polymer in an implantable hydrogel, which is a water-containing flexible material used for tissue engineering and drug delivery. A hydrogel with the new polymer could release medications or imaging agents when hit with NIR. “To the best of our knowledge, this is the first example of a polymeric material capable of disassembly into small molecules in response to harmless levels of irradiation,” say the researchers.
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A practical "smart" material that may supply the missing link in efforts to medically use a form of light that can penetrate four inches into the human body (credit: University of California, San Diego)
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Ref.: Nadezda Fomina, et al., Low Power, Biologically Benign NIR Light Triggers Polymer Disassembly, Macromolecules, 2011; 44 (21): 8590 [DOI: 10.1021/ma201850q]
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