Posts tagged Neuroscience 2013
Articles and news from the latest research reports.
Pregnant mother’s stress affects baby’s gut and brain
Pregnant women may pass on the effects of stress to their fetus by way of bacterial changes in their vagina, suggests a study in mice. It may affect how well their baby’s brain is equipped to deal with stress in adulthood.
The bacteria in our body outnumber our own cells by about 10 to 1, with most of them found in our gut. Over the last few years, it has become clear that the bacterial ecosystem in our body – our microbiome – is essential for developing and maintaining a healthy immune system.
Our gut bugs also help to prevent germs from invading our bodies, and help to absorb nutrients from food.
A baby gets its first major dose of bacteria in life as it passes through its mother’s birth canal. En route, the baby ingests the mother’s vaginal microbes, which begin to colonise the newborn’s gut.
Chris Howerton, then at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, and his colleagues wanted to know if this initial population of bacteria is important in shaping a baby’s neurological development, and whether that population is influenced by stress during pregnancy.
Stressful pregnancy
The first step was to figure out what features of the mother’s vaginal microbiome might be altered by stress, and then see if any of those changes were transmitted to the offspring’s gut.
To do this, the team exposed 10 pregnant mice to a different psychologically stressful experience, such as exposing them to fox odour, keeping their cages lit at night, or temporarily restraining them every day for what would be the equivalent of the first trimester of their pregnancy. Another 10 pregnant mice were housed normally during the same time.
The team took samples of their vaginal bacteria throughout the pregnancy and again just after the mice had given birth. These samples were genetically sequenced to see what types of bacteria were present.
The microbiomes of the stressed mice were remarkably different to those of the unstressed mice after they had each given birth. There were more types of bacteria present, and the proportion of one common gut bacteria, Lactobacillus, was significantly reduced.
Like mother, like pup
To see whether these changes had been passed on to the pups, a few days after birth the pups’ nascent gut bacteria was removed from their colon and sequenced. Sure enough, the same bacterial patterns were seen in the pups of stressed mothers.
By analysing tissue from the pups’ hypothalamus – a brain area involved in hormone control, behaviour and sleep, among other things – the team was able to infer which genes were affected by the stress-induced changes in each mother’s microbiome.
They found that the expression of 20 genes was affected by the decrease in Lactobacillus, including genes related to the production of new neurons and the growth of synaptic connections in the brain.
These genetic outcomes in the brain are probably a result of a different suite of nutrients and metabolites circulating in the “stressed” pup’s blood, thanks to the altered gut flora they inherited. Indeed, when the team analysed the blood of the pups of the stressed mothers, they found that there were fewer molecules present necessary for the formation of essential neurotransmitters – chemicals that transmit signals to the brain. Furthermore, there were lower levels of a molecule thought to protect the brain from harmful oxidative stress.
"These changes are significant and are likely to be important for determining how the brain initially develops and how it will respond in the future to things like stress or changes in the environment," says Tracy Bale, Howerton’s supervisor during the research and director of the University of Pennsylvania lab.
As well as changing the nutrients available, the microbiome could also affect the brain via the immune system or by innervating the nerves in the gut that connect to it. “These three mechanisms aren’t mutually exclusive. It’s likely that they all play a role,” says Howerton.
Human angle
If the same effects are seen in humans, there may be a straightforward solution. “We can easily manipulate the bacteria we have inside of us,” says Howerton. For example, if a certain cocktail of bacteria is found to be beneficial to the newborns of stressed mothers, we could give it to them right after birth, he suggests. This approach could also benefit babies born via C-section, who do not pass through their mother’s birth canal, or those born to mothers whose gut bacteria has been disrupted as a result of antibiotic use during pregnancy.
Bale is now investigating the link between bacteria and brain development in pregnant women who have been through several traumatic experiences to analyse the effects on their babies’ gut bacteria. She also intends to follow their children’s behaviour as they grow up.
Resource rationale
"This is a remarkable trans-disciplinary study in how it bridged multiple organ systems to illuminate a complex question," says Catherine Hagan from the University of Missouri in Columbia. She says that more work needs to be done to show a causal link. "Mice are not tiny people – people are not big mice – more data is needed to understand how stress in mothers affects brain development in children," she says. "That said, mice and people have enough in common that this study provides a rationale for allocating resources to address such a concern."
"At the end of the day, most of what makes you ‘you’, and what drives your quality of life, comes down to the brain," says Bale. "It’s this very important, vulnerable tissue that is susceptible to many perturbations. If the microbiome is proven to be one of these driving forces, then it’s essential we know just how factors in our environment can change it and can reprogram the brain."
(Source: newscientist.com)
![Brain Stimulation May Treat Bulimia
A mild electrical stimulation to a specific brain area could be an effective treatment for some patients with eating disorders such as bulimia, who suffer from episodes of severe binge eating and purging behaviors, researchers say.
After one 42-year-old woman received the electrical stimulation, called transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), as a treatment for her depression, and showed an unexpected recovery from her 20-year battle against bulimia nervosa, her doctors conducted a pilot study to see whether the treatment would also work for other patients with eating disorders, said Dr. Jonathan Downar, of the University of Toronto. Downar described the study Tuesday (Nov. 12) here at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.
In the study, Downar and his colleagues recruited 20 patients with bulimia and stimulated a part of their frontal lobes called the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, which is next to the brain region usually stimulated for treating depression. The patients, who had already tried conventional therapies and medications but had seen no improvement, received 20 sessions of electrical stimulation daily for four weeks.
At the end of the treatment, six of the patients saw their binge eating and purging symptoms almost completely disappear. In another four patients, symptoms improved by more than 50 percent. Eight patients saw only little improvement, and two got worse, Downar said.
Although larger studies and clinical trials are needed to confirm the results of the pilot study, Downar said he is optimistic about the promise of using TMS for treating certain patients with eating disorders.
"There are lots of things you could do to treat disorders like depression, but for these folks [with bulimia], there’s really nothing if they have gone through all of the medications" and therapy options, Downar said.
Eating disorders, such as anorexia and bulimia, affect more than 8 million people in North America. These disorders often carry emotional distress, disrupt the person’s normal life and can even lead to life-threatening medical problems.
TMS is a relatively new technique, and involves a large electromagnetic coil that is placed over the skull, and changes the activity in a targeted brain region by inducing electric currents. Although the change is temporary and reversible, with repeated stimulation, doctors can create lasting changes in neuronal activity. Repeated TMS has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration as a treatment for some forms of depression.
In the study, the researchers used brain imaging to examine whether differences in brain activity could explain why some patients respond well to TMS treatment while others show little or no improvement.
They found that before the treatment, responders had lower connectivity between the frontal lobe and a set of brain areas (such as the striatum) that are linked to rewards and cravings. This low connectivity could be a sign of impulsiveness, and stimulation may have helped to make the missing connection in these patients’ brains, Downar said.
In contrast, the brains of the people whose bulimia was not helped by TMS appeared more connected in those areas. In these patients, TMS appears to be ineffective in treating bulimia because the brain stimulation is “giving them something they don’t need, because they already have it,” Downar said.
The brain imaging results suggest that doctors may be able to identify which patients will respond to TMS treatment, and spare others from a weeks-long treatment.
"By using brain imaging to detect these patterns, we may eventually be able to predict which patients are most likely to benefit," Downar said.](http://41.media.tumblr.com/4a68f318424f5ce4c5a13c20222ed2c8/tumblr_mwgaotVDJX1rog5d1o1_500.jpg)
Brain Stimulation May Treat Bulimia
A mild electrical stimulation to a specific brain area could be an effective treatment for some patients with eating disorders such as bulimia, who suffer from episodes of severe binge eating and purging behaviors, researchers say.
After one 42-year-old woman received the electrical stimulation, called transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), as a treatment for her depression, and showed an unexpected recovery from her 20-year battle against bulimia nervosa, her doctors conducted a pilot study to see whether the treatment would also work for other patients with eating disorders, said Dr. Jonathan Downar, of the University of Toronto. Downar described the study Tuesday (Nov. 12) here at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.
In the study, Downar and his colleagues recruited 20 patients with bulimia and stimulated a part of their frontal lobes called the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, which is next to the brain region usually stimulated for treating depression. The patients, who had already tried conventional therapies and medications but had seen no improvement, received 20 sessions of electrical stimulation daily for four weeks.
At the end of the treatment, six of the patients saw their binge eating and purging symptoms almost completely disappear. In another four patients, symptoms improved by more than 50 percent. Eight patients saw only little improvement, and two got worse, Downar said.
Although larger studies and clinical trials are needed to confirm the results of the pilot study, Downar said he is optimistic about the promise of using TMS for treating certain patients with eating disorders.
"There are lots of things you could do to treat disorders like depression, but for these folks [with bulimia], there’s really nothing if they have gone through all of the medications" and therapy options, Downar said.
Eating disorders, such as anorexia and bulimia, affect more than 8 million people in North America. These disorders often carry emotional distress, disrupt the person’s normal life and can even lead to life-threatening medical problems.
TMS is a relatively new technique, and involves a large electromagnetic coil that is placed over the skull, and changes the activity in a targeted brain region by inducing electric currents. Although the change is temporary and reversible, with repeated stimulation, doctors can create lasting changes in neuronal activity. Repeated TMS has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration as a treatment for some forms of depression.
In the study, the researchers used brain imaging to examine whether differences in brain activity could explain why some patients respond well to TMS treatment while others show little or no improvement.
They found that before the treatment, responders had lower connectivity between the frontal lobe and a set of brain areas (such as the striatum) that are linked to rewards and cravings. This low connectivity could be a sign of impulsiveness, and stimulation may have helped to make the missing connection in these patients’ brains, Downar said.
In contrast, the brains of the people whose bulimia was not helped by TMS appeared more connected in those areas. In these patients, TMS appears to be ineffective in treating bulimia because the brain stimulation is “giving them something they don’t need, because they already have it,” Downar said.
The brain imaging results suggest that doctors may be able to identify which patients will respond to TMS treatment, and spare others from a weeks-long treatment.
"By using brain imaging to detect these patterns, we may eventually be able to predict which patients are most likely to benefit," Downar said.
Heavy smokers could be helped to kick the habit by having their brains zapped with electromagnetic pulses, new research suggests.
Repeated use of a high frequency magnet to stimulate the brain helps some smokers quit for up to six months after treatment, an Israeli study found.
The smokers had already tried a range of treatments, from patches to psychotherapy, raising hopes that brain stimulation could be an effective alternative for those who had so far failed to kick the habit.
Abraham Zangen of Ben Gurion University told the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in San Diego, California, that more than half the smokers given high-frequency magnetic pulses quit.
More than a third were still abstaining six months on.
'Our research shows us that we may actually be able to undo some of the changes to the brain caused by chronic smoking,' said Dr Zangen.
'We know that many smokers want to quit or smoke less and this could help put a dent in the number one cause of preventable deaths.'
Dr Zangen’s team recruited 115 heavy smokers aged between 21 and 70 who were interested in quitting but who had failed in doing so on at least two previous attempts.
They then split the smokers into three groups, giving them either high frequency repeated Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS), low frequency rTMS, or placebo treatment for 13 days.
Repeated high frequency Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS) is a non-invasive technique that uses magnetic fields to stimulate large areas of neurons in the brain.
The researchers focused on stimulating the prefrontal cortex and the insula, which are the two brain areas associated with nicotine addiction.
Before each session, Dr Zangen got one of his PhD students to light a cigarette and take a drag in front of half the smokers in each group to awaken their cravings.
This was to make sure the smokers’ attention was directed at their addiction and not some other craving, said Dr Zangen.
The results were striking. Nearly half - 44 per cent - of the smokers who received the cue before their rTMS session gave up immediately after the 13-day course, with 33 per cent still of the smokes six months later.
Overall, participants who received high frequency rTMS smoked less and were more likely to quit, with success rates four times that of the low frequency group and more than six times greater than the placebo group.
Dr Zangen’s team are now planning a much larger trial involving smokers in several countries, which is set to start in the next few months.
He told The Guardian: ‘It’s quite easy to quit for a few days, or even for a few weeks, but if we can help people quit for more than three months, then they are actually quite unlikely to relapse later on.’
Dr Zanger did reveal that he has a financial interest in the company which provided the Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation equipment used in the study.
Can Certain Herbs Stave Off Alzheimer’s Disease?
Enhanced extracts made from special antioxidants in spearmint and rosemary improve learning and memory, a study in an animal model at Saint Louis University found.
"We found that these proprietary compounds reduce deficits caused by mild cognitive impairment, which can be a precursor to Alzheimer’s disease," said Susan Farr, Ph.D., research professor geriatrics at Saint Louis University School of Medicine.
Farr added, “This probably means eating spearmint and rosemary is good for you. However, our experiments were in an animal model and I don’t know how much — or if any amount — of these herbs people would have to consume for learning and memory to improve. In other words, I’m not suggesting that people chew more gum at this point.”
Farr presented the early findings at Neuroscience 2013, a meeting of 32,000 on Monday, Nov. 11. She tested a novel antioxidant-based ingredient made from spearmint extract and two different doses of a similar antioxidant made from rosemary extract on mice that have age-related cognitive decline.
She found that the higher dose rosemary extract compound was the most powerful in improving memory and learning in three tested behaviors. The lower dose rosemary extract improved memory in two of the behavioral tests, as did the compound made from spearmint extract.
Further, there were signs of reduced oxidative stress, which is considered a hallmark of age-related decline, in the part of the brain that controls learning and memory.
"Our research suggests these extracts made from herbs might have beneficial effects on altering the course of age-associated cognitive decline," Farr said. "It’s worth additional study."
Our relationship with food: What drives us to eat and new insights into eating disorders
A growing body of evidence shows the impact of diet on brain function, and identifies patterns of brain activity associated with eating disorders such as binge eating and purging. The findings were presented at Neuroscience 2013, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience and the world’s largest source of emerging news about brain science and health.
Millions of people worldwide suffer from eating disorders such as anorexia, bulimia, and binge eating. With increased risk for psychiatric and chronic diseases, today’s studies are valuable in helping generate new strategies to treat disorders from obesity to anorexia.
Today’s new findings show that:
- Targeted magnetic stimulation of the brain reduces the symptoms of severe eating disorders, including bingeing and purging. These findings may represent a new treatment tool for patients with eating disorders (Jonathan Downar, MD, PhD, abstract 540.01, see attached summary).
- Rats that are more naturally impulsive tend to consume more calories on a binge. Findings suggest that this may be due to an imbalance in the brain’s serotonin system (Noelle Anastasio, PhD, abstract 547.13, see attached summary).
Other recent findings discussed show that:
- Consuming a diet of red meat and processed foods is linked to a decline in verybal memory in the elderly after just 36 months (Samantha Gardener, see attached summary).
- Consuming cannabis can influence body weight ofoffspring for generations (Yasmin Hurd, PhD, presentation 685.05, see attached speaker summary).
- Eating a sweet, high-fat meal sets off a series of events that includes the release of insulin and suppression of dopamine, leading to less interest in food-related cues in the environment (Stephanie Borgland, PhD, presentation 685.06, see attached speaker summary).
“As scientists uncover the impacts of diet on brain function, the adage ‘You are what you eat,’ takes on new meaning,” said press conference moderator Fernando Gomez-Pinilla, PhD, of the University of California, Los Angeles, an expert in the impact of the environment on brain health. “We cannot separate the nutritional benefits of food for the body from that of the mind. What we put into the body also shapes the brain, for better or for worse.”
Can the Eyes Help Diagnose Alzheimer’s Disease?
An international team of researchers studying the link between vision loss and Alzheimer’s disease report that the loss of a particular layer of retinal cells not previously investigated may reveal the disease’s presence and provide a new way to track disease progression.
The researchers, from Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC) and the University of Hong Kong, examined retinas from the eyes of mice genetically engineered to develop Alzheimer’s disease (AD). They presented their findings today at Neuroscience 2013, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.
“The retina is an extension of the brain so it makes sense to see if the same pathologic processes found in an Alzheimer’s brain are also found in the eye,” explains R. Scott Turner, MD, PhD, director of the Memory Disorders Program at GUMC and the only U.S. author on the study. “We know there’s an association between glaucoma and Alzheimer’s in that both are characterized by loss of neurons, but the mechanisms are not clear.”
Turner says many researchers increasingly view glaucoma as a neurodegenerative disorder similar to AD.
Most of the research to date examining the relationship between glaucoma and Alzheimer’s focused on the retinal ganglion cell layer, which transmits visual information via the optic nerve into the brain. Before that transmission happens, though, the retinal ganglion cells receive information from another layer in the retina called the inner nuclear layer.
In their study, the researchers looked at the thickness of the retina, including the inner nuclear layer (not previously study in this setting) and the retinal ganglion cell layer. They found a significant loss of thickness in both. The inner nuclear layer had a 37 percent loss of neurons and the retinal ganglion cell layer a 49 percent loss, compared with healthy, age-matched control mice.
In humans, the structure and thickness of the retina can be readily measured using optical coherence tomography. Turner says this new tool is increasing finding applications in research and clinical care.
“This study suggests another path forward in understanding the disease process and could lead to new ways to diagnose or predict Alzheimer’s that could be as simple as looking into the eyes,” Turner says. “Parallel disease mechanisms suggest that new treatments developed for Alzheimer’s may also be useful for glaucoma.”
Musical training shapes brain anatomy and affects function
New findings show that extensive musical training affects the structure and function of different brain regions, how those regions communicate during the creation of music, and how the brain interprets and integrates sensory information. The findings were presented at Neuroscience 2013, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience and the world’s largest source of emerging news about brain science and health.
These insights suggest potential new roles for musical training including fostering plasticity in the brain, an alternative tool in education, and treating a range of learning disabilities.
Today’s new findings show that:
- Long-term high level musical training has a broader impact than previously thought. Researchers found that musicians have an enhanced ability to integrate sensory information from hearing, touch, and sight (Julie Roy, abstract 550.13, see attached summary).
- The age at which musical training begins affects brain anatomy as an adult; beginning training before the age of seven has the greatest impact (Yunxin Wang, abstract 765.07, see attached summary).
- Brain circuits involved in musical improvisation are shaped by systematic training, leading to less reliance on working memory and more extensive connectivity within the rain (Ana Pinho, MS, abstract 122.13, see attached summary).
Some of the brain changes that occur with musical training reflect the automation of task (much as one would recite a multiplication table) and the acquisition of highly specific sensorimotor and cognitive skills required for various aspects of musical expertise.
“Playing a musical instrument is a multisensory and motor experience that creates emotions and motions — from finger tapping to dancing — and engages pleasure and reward systems in the brain. It has the potential to change brain function and structure when done over a long period of time,” said press conference moderator Gottfried Schlaug, MD, PhD, of Harvard Medical School/Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, an expert on music, neuroimaging and brain plasticity. “As today’s findings show, intense musical training generates new processes within the brain, at different stages of life, and with a range of impacts on creativity, cognition, and learning.”
Mindfulness Inhibits Implicit Learning — The Wellspring of Bad Habits
Being mindful appears to help prevent the formation of bad habits, but perhaps good ones too. Georgetown University researchers are trying to unravel the impact of implicit learning, and their findings might appear counterintuitive — at first.
Consider this: when testing who would do best on a task to find patterns among a bunch of dots many might think mindful people would score higher than those who are distracted, but researchers found the opposite — participants low on the mindfulness scale did much better on this test of implicit learning, the kind of learning that occurs without awareness.
This outcome might be surprising until one considers that behavioral and neuroimaging studies suggest that mindfulness can undercut the automatic learning processes — the kind that lead to development of good and bad habits, says the study’s lead author, Chelsea Stillman, a psychology PhD student. Stillman works in the Cognitive Aging Laboratory, led by the study’s senior investigator, Darlene Howard, PhD, Davis Family Distinguished Professor in the department of psychology and member of the Georgetown Center for Brain Plasticity and Recovery.
This study was aimed at examining how individual differences in mindfulness are related to implicit learning. “Our theory is that one learns habits — good or bad — implicitly, without thinking about them,” Stillman says. “So we wanted to see if mindfulness impeded implicit learning.”
That is what they found. Two samples of adult participants first completed a test that gauged their mindfulness character trait, and then they completed different tasks that measured implicit learning – either the Triplet-Learning Task or the Alternating Serial Reaction Time Task test. Both tasks used circles on a screen and participants were asked to respond to the location of certain colored circles. These tasks tested the ability of participants to learn complex, probabilistic patterns, although test takers would not be aware of that.
The researchers found that people reporting low on the mindfulness scale tended to learn more — their reaction times were quicker in targeting events that occurred more often within a context of preceding events than those that occurred less often.
“The very fact of paying too much attention or being too aware of stimuli coming up in these tests might actually inhibit implicit learning,” Stillman says. “That suggests that mindfulness may help prevent formation of automatic habits — which is done through implicit learning — because a mindful person is aware of what they are doing.”
New links between social status and brain activity
New studies released today reveal links between social status and specific brain structures and activity, particularly in the context of social stress. The findings were presented at Neuroscience 2013, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience and the world’s largest source of emerging news about brain science and health.
Using human and animal models, these studies may help explain why position in social hierarchies strongly influences decision-making, motivation, and altruism, as well as physical and mental health. Understanding social decision-making and social ladders may also aid strategies to enhance cooperation and could be applied to everyday situations from the classroom to the boardroom.
Today’s new findings show that:
- Adult rats living in disrupted environments produce fewer new brain cells than rats in stable societies, supporting theories that unstable conditions impair mental health and cognition (Maya Opendak, abstract 85.11, see attached summary).
- People who have many friends have certain brain regions that are bigger and better connected than those with fewer friends. It’s unknown whether their brains were predisposed to social engagement or whether larger social networks prompted brain development (Maryann Noonan, PhD, abstract 667.11, see attached summary).
- In situations where monkeys can potentially cooperate to improve their mutual reward, certain groups of brain cells work to accurately predict the responses of other monkeys (Keren Haroush, PhD, abstract 668.08, see attached summary).
- Following extreme social stress, enhancing brain changes associated with depression can have ananti-depressant effect in mice (Allyson Friedman, PhD, abstract 504.05, see attached summary).
Other recent findings discussed show that:
- Defeats heighten sensitivity to social hierarchies and may exacerbate brain activity related to social anxiety (Romain Ligneul, presentation 186.12, see attached speaker summary).
“Social subordination and social instability have been associated with an increased incidence of mental illness in humans,” said press conference moderator Larry Young, PhD, of Emory University, an expert in brain functions involved with social behavior. “We now have a better picture of how these situations impact the brain. While this information could lead to new treatments, it also calls on us to evaluate how we construct social hierarchies — whether in the workplace or school — and their impacts on human well-being.”
Studies pinpoint specific brain areas and mechanisms associated with depression and anxiety
Research released today reveals new mechanisms and areas of the brain associated with anxiety and depression, presenting possible targets to understand and treat these debilitating mental illnesses. The findings were presented at Neuroscience 2013, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience and the world’s largest source of emerging news about brain science and health.
More than 350 million people worldwide suffer from clinical depression and between 5 and 25 percent of adults suffer from generalized anxiety, according to the World Health Organization. The resulting emotional and financial costs to people, families, and society are significant. Further, antidepressants are not always effective and often cause severe side effects.
Today’s new findings show that:
- A molecule in the immune system may contribute to depression, suggesting a potential biomarker for the disease (Georgia Hodes, PhD, abstract 542.1, see attached summary).
- Decreasing a chemical signal in the amygdala, a brain area associated with emotional processing, produces antidepressant-like effects in mice (Yann Mineur, PhD, abstract 504, see attached summary).
- MicroRNAs, tiny molecules that alter gene expression, correlate with how mice respond to socially stressful situations that cause depressive-like behavior. The findings may help determine why some people are more likely to suffer from depression than others (Karen Scott, PhD, abstract 731.2, see attached summary).
Other recent findings discussed show that:
- A pathway between two brain regions, the amygdala and the hippocampus, plays a significant role in anxiety. Shutting down this connection can decrease anxiety-like behavior in mice (Ada Felix-Ortiz, MS, presentation 393.01, see attached speaker summary).
- Aversive experiences can change how humans, particularly those with anxiety disorders, perceive stimuli. After a severe negative incident, patients with anxiety disorders over-generalize the experience and have increased emotional responses to subsequent similar situations (Rony Paz, PhD, presentation 295.05, see attached speaker summary).
“Today’s findings represent our rapidly growing understanding of the individual molecules and brain circuits that may contribute to depression and anxiety,” said press conference moderator Lisa Monteggia, PhD, of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, an expert on mechanisms of antidepressant action. “These exciting discoveries represent the potential for significant changes in how we diagnose and treat these illnesses that touch millions.”