wwwswagqueentumblrcom - Tumblr blog

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Little frog knight based on Beyx’s "Frog" . First time using cloth sim.

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Watching Molecules Morph into Memories

In two studies in the January 24 issue of Science (1, 2), researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University used advanced imaging techniques to provide a window into how the brain makes memories. These insights into the molecular basis of memory were made possible by a technological tour de force never before achieved in animals: a mouse model developed at Einstein in which molecules crucial to making memories were given fluorescent “tags” so they could be observed traveling in real time in living brain cells.

Efforts to discover how neurons make memories have long confronted a major roadblock: Neurons are extremely sensitive to any kind of disruption, yet only by probing their innermost workings can scientists view the molecular processes that culminate in memories. To peer deep into neurons without harming them, Einstein researchers developed a mouse model in which they fluorescently tagged all molecules of messenger RNA (mRNA) that code for beta-actin protein – an essential structural protein found in large amounts in brain neurons and considered a key player in making memories. mRNA is a family of RNA molecules that copy DNA’s genetic information and translate it into the proteins that make life possible.

"It’s noteworthy that we were able to develop this mouse without having to use an artificial gene or other interventions that might have disrupted neurons and called our findings into question," said Robert Singer, Ph.D., the senior author of both papers and professor and co-chair of Einstein’s department of anatomy & structural biology and co-director of the Gruss Lipper Biophotonics Center at Einstein. He also holds the Harold and Muriel Block Chair in Anatomy & Structural Biology at Einstein.

In the research described in the two Science papers, the Einstein researchers stimulated neurons from the mouse’s hippocampus, where memories are made and stored, and then watched fluorescently glowing beta-actin mRNA molecules form in the nuclei of neurons and travel within dendrites, the neuron’s branched projections. They discovered that mRNA in neurons is regulated through a novel process described as “masking” and “unmasking,” which allows beta-actin protein to be synthesized at specific times and places and in specific amounts.

"We know the beta-actin mRNA we observed in these two papers was ‘normal’ RNA, transcribed from the mouse’s naturally occurring beta-actin gene," said Dr. Singer. "And attaching green fluorescent protein to mRNA molecules did not affect the mice, which were healthy and able to reproduce."

Neurons come together at synapses, where slender dendritic “spines” of neurons grasp each other, much as the fingers of one hand bind those of the other. Evidence indicates that repeated neural stimulation increases the strength of synaptic connections by changing the shape of these interlocking dendrite “fingers.” Beta-actin protein appears to strengthen these synaptic connections by altering the shape of dendritic spines. Memories are thought to be encoded when stable, long-lasting synaptic connections form between neurons in contact with each other.

The first paper describes the work of Hye Yoon Park, Ph.D., a postdoctoral student in Dr. Singer’s lab at the time and now an instructor at Einstein. Her research was instrumental in developing the mice containing fluorescent beta-actin mRNA—a process that took about three years.

Dr. Park stimulated individual hippocampal neurons of the mouse and observed newly formed beta-actin mRNA molecules within 10 to 15 minutes, indicating that nerve stimulation had caused rapid transcription of the beta-actin gene. Further observations suggested that these beta-actin mRNA molecules continuously assemble and disassemble into large and small particles, respectively. These mRNA particles were seen traveling to their destinations in dendrites where beta-actin protein would be synthesized.

In the second paper, lead author and graduate student Adina Buxbaum of Dr. Singer’s lab showed that neurons may be unique among cells in how they control the synthesis of beta-actin protein.

"Having a long, attenuated structure means that neurons face a logistical problem," said Dr. Singer. "Their beta-actin mRNA molecules must travel throughout the cell, but neurons need to control their mRNA so that it makes beta-actin protein only in certain regions at the base of dendritic spines."

Ms. Buxbaum’s research revealed the novel mechanism by which brain neurons handle this challenge. She found that as soon as beta-actin mRNA molecules form in the nucleus of hippocampal neurons and travel out to the cytoplasm, the mRNAs are packaged into granules and so become inaccessible for making protein. She then saw that stimulating the neuron caused these granules to fall apart, so that mRNA molecules became unmasked and available for synthesizing beta-actin protein.

But that observation raised a question: How do neurons prevent these newly liberated mRNAs from making more beta-actin protein than is desirable? “Ms. Buxbaum made the remarkable observation that mRNA’s availability in neurons is a transient phenomenon,” said Dr. Singer. “She saw that after the mRNA molecules make beta-actin protein for just a few minutes, they suddenly repackage and once again become masked. In other words, the default condition for mRNA in neurons is to be packaged and inaccessible.”

These findings suggest that neurons have developed an ingenious strategy for controlling how memory-making proteins do their job. “This observation that neurons selectively activate protein synthesis and then shut it off fits perfectly with how we think memories are made,” said Dr. Singer. “Frequent stimulation of the neuron would make mRNA available in frequent, controlled bursts, causing beta-actin protein to accumulate precisely where it’s needed to strengthen the synapse.”

To gain further insight into memory’s molecular basis, the Singer lab is developing technologies for imaging neurons in the intact brains of living mice in collaboration with another Einstein faculty member in the same department, Vladislav Verkhusha, Ph.D. Since the hippocampus resides deep in the brain, they hope to develop infrared fluorescent proteins that emit light that can pass through tissue. Another possibility is a fiberoptic device that can be inserted into the brain to observe memory-making hippocampal neurons.

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Im still not getting tumblr, confuseddd

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Time flies...cant believe im already 5 months into year 12 ahhh scaarryyy :(

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

This statement by Bayer CEO sums up everything that is wrong with the multinational pharmaceutical industry. Pharmaceutical companies are singularly focused on profit and so aggressively push for patents and high drug prices. Diseases that don’t promise a profit are neglected, and patients who can’t afford to pay are cut out of the picture. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Read our response:http://ow.ly/sS4Uc

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Take me back to last summer please? Maldives <3

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Just realised how boring my tumblr page looks :L

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Human Rights!

International Human Rights day tomorrow! woahh :D ya'll best not violate anyone's Human Rights, wont that be ironic.

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

wow got the most attractive avatar picture

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Listening to the inner voice

Perhaps the most controversial book ever written in the field of psychology, was Julian Janes’ mid-seventies classic, “The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind.” In it, Jaynes reaches the stunning conclusion that the seemingly all-pervasive and demanding gods of the ancients, were not just whimsical personifications of inanimate objects like the sun or moon, nor anthropomorphizations of the various beasts, real and mythical, but rather the culturally-barren inner voices of bilaterally-symmetric brains not yet fully connected, nor conscious, in the way we are today.

In his view, all people of the day would have “heard voices”, similar to the schizophrenic. They would have been experienced as a hallucinations of sorts, coming from outside themselves as the unignorable voices of gods, rather than as commands originating from the other side of the brain. After a long hiatus, the study the inner voice, and the larger mental baggage that comes along with having one, has returned to the fore. Vaughan Bell, a researcher from King’s College in London, recently published an insightful call to arms in PlOS Biology for psychologists and neurobiologists to create a new understanding of these phenomena.

A coherent inner narrative in synch with our actions, is something most of us take for granted. Yet not everyone can take such possession. The congenitally deaf, for example, may later acquire auditory and communicative function through the use of cochlear implants. However, their inner experiences of sound-powered word, which they acquire through the reattribution of percepts of a previous gestural or visual nature, is something not typically shared or appreciated at the level of the larger public. A similar lack of comprehension at the research community level exists regarding those with physically intact senses, but with some other mental process gone awry. We may note with familiarity the shuffling and muttering of a homeless schizophrenic, yet have no systematic way to comprehend their intuitions, no matter how deluded they may appear.

Bell notes that current neurocognitive theories tend to ignore how those who hear voices first acquire what he describes as “internalized social actors.” In addition to live social interactions, “offline” social interaction with an internal model of those individuals holding significant power in our lives would seem like a handy feature to have. We can readily imagine entirely non-pathological situations where such a model would be of benefit. A young child cut from a school basketball team which they worked hard to make, may be temporality devastated, but hardly traumatized. If they renew their efforts to make the team the next year and practice each day in their backyard, they might imagine the coach who cut them watching their every shot with a critical eye. While this hallucinated guidance would be entirely benign, if the person they imagine is instead an abusive parent or classmate, the internal model might eventually take on a more sinister nature.

It would seem that at least in some individuals, the internal model seems able to get the upper hand, particularly when that hand is forced. We might imagine a school child tasked with the tedium of a seemingly endless recitation—saying the rosary beads, for example, in the catholic school days of yore. The familiar “Hail Mary, full of Grace……” might, after so many repetitions, transform in the mind into something else, despite the earnestness of the professor of faith. “Hail Mary, full of …..” might instead be completed with a different choice word that intrudes from another collective in the brain despite the alarmed child’s efforts to suppress it. In the situation where this is vocalized externally, completely out of control as in full blown Tourette’s syndrome, the child now has a problem.

The idea that separate voices represent separate hemispheres may be a good starting point, but it can readily be dispatched as far as being the whole story. Auditory hallucinations can take the form of multiple social actors, clearly outnumbering our hemispheres, and all with different tones, personalities, and persistence of identity. Attempts have been made to localize brain activity to a particular narrative using EEG recording, or to elicit a hallucination using magnetic stimulation. While the occasional inciteful anecdote may be gleaned from these kinds of investigations, we should not expect much fine detail to ever be had from them. The cortical area known as the temporoparietal junction routinely emerges as a favorite among brain imagers because of its geometric location at the pinnacle of the major fold in the brain. Unfortunately, until there exists a large scale minimally damaging recording technology we are probably going to have to content ourselves with looking closer at what subjects have to say about their own auditory hallucinations, than what their brains might have to say.

As children we learn to talk by talking to ourselves. Unless marooned on an island, we tend to abandon this behavior in polite company for fear of stigmatization, among other things. If the line between normalcy and pathology for hearing voices, or even talking to them, (so long as they do not command undesirable physical actions), is drawn with a greater acceptance for normalcy, a clearer understanding of the inner voice might be sooner in hand.

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Missing Mandela.

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

According to Gertrude Stein, “A rose is a rose is a rose,” but new research indicates that might not be the case when it comes to the rose’s scent. Researchers from the Monell Center and collaborating institutions have found that as much as 30 percent of the large array of human olfactory receptor...

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

TSK: Well, that trick USUALLY works...

Cranquis *noticing that the child patient is acting nervous*: Hi buddy! I see you brought a friend with you! What's his name?

4-year-old boy *holding stuffed elephant*: ...Elephant.

Cranquis: That's an easy name to remember, huh? So is Elephant feeling sick today too?

Boy *gives me a patronizing raised-eyebrow look*: Uh, NO, he's a STUFFED ANIMAL.

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Libyan authorities should urgently announce the results of promised investigations into at least two deadly clashes between protesters and militias during 2013. The clashes killed dozens of people and injured hundreds. Six months after 32 people died in Benghazi on June 8, 2013, in what came to be known as “Black Saturday,” the authorities have made no known arrests, have been silent on the identities of any suspects, and seem unwilling to conduct a thorough and impartial investigation, Human Rights Watch said. In the second clash, on November 15 in Tripoli, at least 46 people died and 500 were injured.

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Should be writing my Philosophy essay, but effort. Something I don't have :p

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

oh Hitler, such a flirt (no offense or harm intended by posting Hitler pictures)

[wwwswagqueentumblrcom]

Okay so it seems that whatever I post goes to my blog, so I guess im just here created blogs and following people...im assuming :/