Williams syndrome (WS) was first described in 1961 by New Zealand cardiologist John Williams. It is mostly caused by the microdeletion 7q11.23, a loss of a fragment of genetic material on chromosome 7. It is usually a “de novo” mutation, that is, it is not inherited from the parents, but rather arises in that child […]
From advertising to the workplace, it is often assumed that men and women are fundamentally different – from Mars and Venus, respectively. Of course, we all know people who are more androgynous, having a mix of personality traits that are stereotypically considered to be male or female. Importantly, such “psychological androgyny” has long been associated […]
The intranasal route is a rapid, efficient and direct way for different biological agents, small molecules, drugs and chemical compounds to reach the brain. It seems amazing, but people that snort a line of coke already knew that… To date, its mechanism of diffusion is believed to be using either olfactory nerve tracts or dense […]
Depression is a psychiatric and psychological diagnosis that describes a temporary or permanent mood disorder characterized by feelings of dejection, unhappiness and guilt. Depressed people show a low mood and an aversion to activity and are characterized by sadness, difficulty thinking and concentrating, and a significant increase or decrease in appetite and time spent sleeping […]
Going through a break up is kind of traumatic. We all have felt it sometime, not only your heart is broken but your brain feels like out of sync and incapable of proper functioning. Well, this is not just an impression, new research has found there is a relationship between a broken heart and a […]
To date, more than 50 million people have been infected with the new coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, and more than 1,2 million have died. It is a global problem, affecting everyone, but we are still learning how it infects, how it behaves, what causes harm to humans. The virus is spread by the droplets produced by an […]
How can we experience a sensation that is not real? How to mimic a sensory stimulus in its absence? How to smell a smell when there is none there? By activating certain neurons, it seems. A group of researchers at New York University’s Grossman School of Medicine have recently published an article in Science […]
Body odor is present in all mammals, including of course humans. It has a clear genetic basis, although it is modulated by different conditions, both normal and pathological. Interestingly, although it is believed to have an important communicative function and to be involved in sexual attraction, body odor is considered unpleasant by most people, which […]
Amyloid plaques are a hallmark of some neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s. Even though the exact role of amyloid protein in the disease is not clear, being able to follow amyloid protein misfolding and plaque formation could be a step forward for the study of the disease. Now, Matthew Lew’s lab has developed a […]
Think nothing. Your brain is always on, as your heart, liver or kidneys are, so thinking nothing is the closer you’ll get to a resting state for it, because even when we sleep the brain is quite active. We know that the interactions among different brain regions can be studied with functional magnetic resonance imaging […]