Author: Julie

New research led by University of Toronto neurologist Andrew Lim sheds light on sleep disruption in aging adults.

“In many older people with insomnia and other patterns of sleep disruption, the underlying cause is unknown,” said Lim, assistant professor of neurology and neuroscientist at Sunnybrook Health Sciences.

“We provide evidence that loss of neurons in a particular region of the brain that controls sleep may be an important contributor to insomnia in many older individuals.” Continue reading →

Study suggests ways to treat these deficits before the psychiatric symptoms develop

Researchers at the University of Montreal and CHU Sainte-Justine Research Centre have traced the origins of ADHD, substance abuse and conduct disorder, and found that they develop from the same neurocognitive deficits, which in turn explains why they often occur together. “Psychopathology exists on multiple continua of brain function. Some of these dimensions contribute to a multitude of problems, others contribute to specific problems. Together, they explain patterns of comorbidity such as why ADHD and conduct problems co-occur with substance misuse at such a high rate,” explained the study’s lead author, Professor Patricia Conrod. Continue reading →

Discovery sheds light on where visual memories are born

“When a tiger starts to move towards you, you need to know whether it is something you are actually seeing or whether it’s just something that you remember or have imagined,” says Prof. Julio Martinez-Trujillo of McGill’s Department of Physiology. The researcher and his team have discovered that there is a clear frontier in the brain between the area that encodes information about what is immediately before the eyes and the area that encodes the abstract representations that are the product of our short-term memory or imagination. Continue reading →

Findings suggest a brain cell’s activity helps determine whether it will hold a subsequent memory

Understanding how and where memories are normally stored in the brain will be the key to developing new treatments for memory disorders. Memories are thought to be created through the strengthening of connections between brain cells (neurons) to form a memory. In a new study led by The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), researchers have discovered one important factor that determines which precise neurons are selected to store a given memory and where this memory is stored. The study is published in the August 6 online edition of Neuron. Continue reading →

Genes, pathways identified could inform new approaches to treatment

As part of a multinational, collaborative effort, researchers from Canada’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) have helped identify over 100 locations in the human genome associated with the risk of developing schizophrenia, in what is the largest genomic study published on any psychiatric disorder to date. The findings, published online in Nature, point to biological mechanisms and pathways that may underlie schizophrenia, and could lead to new approaches to treating the disorder, which has seen little innovation in drug development in more than 60 years. Continue reading →

Humans have developed sophisticated concepts like mass and gravity to explain a wide range of everyday phenomena, but scientists have remarkably little understanding of how such concepts are represented by the brain.

Using advanced neuroimaging techniques, Queen’s University researchers have revealed how the brain stores knowledge about an object’s weight – information critical to our ability to successfully grasp and interact with objects in our environment. Continue reading →

A genetic variant conveys significant protection

Judes Poirier, PhD, C.Q., from the Douglas Mental Health Institute and McGill University in Montréal (Canada) and his team have discovered that a relatively frequent genetic variant actually conveys significant protection against the common form of Alzheimer’s disease and can delay the onset of the disease by as much as 4 years. This discovery opens new avenues for treatment against this devastating disease. Continue reading →

Scientists at the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital, McGill University and McGill University Health Centre have shown that a member of the protein family known as SUMO (small ubiquitin-like modifier) is a key to why tumour cells multiply uncontrollably, especially in the case of glioblastoma. The SUMO family proteins modify other proteins and the SUMOylation of proteins are critical for many cellular processes. Identifying SUMO’s role in the cancer cell growth will lead to a new strategy for glioblastoma treatment. Continue reading →

A study published in the scientific journal Nature Neuroscience by Yves De Koninck and Robert Bonin, two researchers at Université Laval, reveals that it is possible to relieve pain hypersensitivity using a new method that involves rekindling pain so that it can subsequently be erased. This discovery could lead to novel means to alleviate chronic pain. Continue reading →

An international team of researchers has discovered a significant genetic component of Idiopathic Generalized Epilepsy (IGE), the most common form of epilepsy. Epilepsy is a neurological disorder characterized by sudden, uncontrolled electrical discharges in the brain expressed as a seizure. The new research, published in this week’s issue of EMBO Reports, implicates a mutation in the gene for a protein, known as cotransporter KCC2. Continue reading →