#5ThoughtsFriday
01/04/2019
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#5ThoughtsFriday is Powered By
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Here are the 5 things we thought were
worth sharing with you this week:
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Bethesda, Maryland firm BrainScope
has earned a new FDA clearance for its technology designed to
detect concussions and their severity.
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Bethesda's BrainScope Co. Inc. has landed a new federal clearance, validating its technology's ability to detect and assess concussions.
BrainScope makes a portable medical device that can quickly assess a range of traumatic brain injuries. The company's tech recently received clearance from the Food and Drug Administration for use as a “multi-modal, multi-parameter assessment,” to determine the likelihood that someone has suffered a "concussion" or "mild traumatic brain injury," and evaluate how severe the injury may be.
The announcement follows on a large clinical study the company launched last year, in which subjects between ages 13 and 25 who had sustained a head injury from a variety of causes were evaluated using its concussion-detecting technology.
“[This clearance] recognizes the unique capabilities of our...medical device with labeling distinctively and specifically for this particular disease state,” CEO Michael Singer said in a statement.
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A
Researchers have discovered a novel and unexpected function of nestin, the best known marker of neural stem cells.
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Researchers at Sahlgrenska Academy at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, in collaboration with research groups in Finland, Canada, and Slovenia, have discovered a novel and unexpected function of nestin, the best known marker of neural stem cells.
In the developing brain, the 3 main cell types, specifically neurons, astrocytes and oligodendrocytes, are generated from neural stem cells. In some parts of the brain, such as the hippocampus, the brain region involved in learning and memory, new neurons are being added to the existing neuronal circuitry even in the adulthood when severe restriction of neuronal differentiation occurs.
Using mice deficient in nestin, a protein that is a component of the part of the cytoskeleton known as intermediate filaments or nanofilaments, the research team led by Prof. Milos Pekny showed that nestin produced in astrocytes has an important role in inhibiting neuronal differentiation. They linked this regulatory function of nestin to the Notch signaling from astrocytes to neighboring neural stem cells. Thus, surprisingly, nestin does not control the generation of neurons by acting within neural stem cells, but indirectly by regulating the neurogenesis-inhibitory Notch signals that neural stem cells receive from astrocytes, important constituents of the neurogenic niche.
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How is it that a sound can send a chill down your spine?
By observing individual brain cells of mice, scientists at
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) are understanding
how a sound can incite fear.
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Investigator
Bo Li
focuses on a part of the mouse brain called the amygdala where sights, sounds, and other stimuli take on positive or negative associations through experience. The continuous process of learning and unlearning that occurs in the amygdala appears impaired in people with anxiety disorders or major depression. Understanding brain cell, or neuron activity in the amygdala could result in better treatments.
In the October issue of
Nature Communications,
Li and postdoctoral researcher Xian Zhang describe profound changes in neuron activity when they trained animals to fear a particular sound and associate another sound with a reward. “If you look at the patterns of brain cell activity in the amygdala, you can know whether the animal is expecting a reward or fearing a punishment,” Li explains.
Li and Zhang used a microscope with a lens small enough to implant in the brain of a mouse, to track the firing activity of specific neurons before, during, and after an animal’s training. They taught the animals to associate particular sounds with reward or punishment and saw the behavior of neurons evolve.
CLICK HERE to read about the amygdala and learned fear.
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2) What We Are Reading That You Might Enjoy
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What do Madonna, Martha Stewart, John Lennon, Ellen DeGeneres, Ben Franklin, Ronald Reagan, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison, and Johnny Cash have in common?
Each is (or was) a list maker.
These successful people, along with CEOs and successful entrepreneurs, all use lists to keep track of their ideas, thoughts, and tasks. Finding enough hours in the day to get everything accomplished and allow for some downtime can be a struggle. It's no wonder so many of us are stressed, overextended, and exhausted. More than half of all American employees feel overwhelmed, according to a study by the nonprofit Family and Work Institute.
For the 54 percent of us who feel like we’re chasing our own tails, Listful Thinking is here to prove that it doesn't have to be that way. You can still find time to relax, read a good book, and do the things you love. Listful Thinking is the book that will give readers their lives back with indispensible tips on saving time, getting organized, improving productivity, saving money, and reducing stress.
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5)
Quote We Are Contemplating...
“And now we welcome the new year. Full of things that have never been."
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Want to find a story from a past #5ThoughtsFriday blog posts, visit the archive by clicking
HERE
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info@biamd.org
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#5ThoughtsFriday
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Thanks for reading! Have a wonderful weekend.
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