Monthly Archives: May 2018

Currently, no reliable predictors of cognitive impairment in Parkinson’s disease exist. The authors hypothesized that microstructural changes in specific cholinergic and limbic pathways underlie cognitive impairment in Parkinson’s disease. They performed cross-sectional comparisons between patients with Parkinson’s disease with and … Continue reading →

“Dopamine is a critical modulator of both learning and motivation. This presents a problem: how can target cells know whether increased dopamine is a signal to learn or to move? It is often presumed that motivation involves slow (‘tonic’) dopamine changes, while fast (‘phasic’) dopamine fluctuations convey … Continue reading →

The authors of this report examined the prospective relationship between physical activity and incident depression and explored potential moderators. Prospective cohort studies evaluating incident depression were searched from database inception through Oct. 18, 2017, on PubMed, PsycINFO, Embase, and SPORTDiscus. Demographic and clinical data, data on physical activity and depression assessments, and odds ratios, relative risks, … Continue reading →

The behavioral state of an individual can dramatically alter how information is processed in its neural circuits. In this study, Albergaria et al. show that locomotion enhances the performance of a cerebellum-dependent behavior…….performance in delay eyeblink conditioning. Specifically, increased locomotor … Continue reading →

NATURE NEWS FEATURE  24 APRIL 2018 Is ‘friendly fire’ in the brain provoking Alzheimer’s disease? Scientists want to combat dementia and neurodegeneration by keeping the brain’s immune system from going rogue.   https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-04930-7