Neurology Diagnostics

Archive for the ‘Brain Info’ Category

Music is part of our life and is good for the development of our brain, but also has its “negative.”

The pleasure we play music is because our brain is producing large amounts of dopamine , a neurotransmitter which also is released when having sex or when we eat.

Benefits of music

It has been shown that listening to music promotes the creation of neural networks that stimulate our creativity. In this sense, the researcher Nina Kraus, Northwestern University (USA) showed that while a person playing a musical instrument establishing neural connections that promote verbal communication. That is why children who have received musical training tend to speak better than those who have received it.

The music is also good for our circulation. So when we hear music that is pleasing the diameter of our blood vessels dilate, thereby improving blood flow, or at least that’s the conclusion we have reached Medical Center researchers at the University of Maryland (USA)

The music has a lot of math and this relationship has been demonstrated by a group of researchers at the University of Toronto (Canada). The scientists conducted a study in children 6 years, noting that those who received musical training increased their math skills and IQ .

In this research, Professor Gordon Shaw, University of California Irving (USA) conducted a study in 19 preschool children and found that when children listened to classical music cortical neurons exercised and strengthened some of the circuits that are used to perform mathematical reasoning. Since we found that at 8 months into the study, children who received music lessons improved their reasoning and their ability to do puzzles, compared to those children who received no music lessons.

Also, listen to music while practicing some form of sport makes it rise to 15% physical performance, according to a report by scientists at Brunel University in the Journal of Sport & Exercise Psychology.
“Iniquities” of music

But not everything is good, music has its “evil”. Thus, in an article published in Applied Cognitive Psychology the authors concluded that the background music reduces job performance, regardless of the type of music you’re listening to (classical, rock, pop …). It is true that this rule is not always true. Thus, it is said that the American writer Stephen King wrote some of his best-selling listening to rock music blaring in the background.

Finally, have you ever wondered why many bars have music so loud? Well, apparently, and according to an article published in Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, the higher the sound more drink is consumed in less time.

In short, the benefits of music on the brain occur in different brain areas, but especially those related to solving mathematical tasks.

From the 40 years starts on brain aging, often associated with a gradual decline in memory.

Our brain consists of about 100,000 million neurons that are “surrounded” by a trillion supporting cells. These cells are set trillion synapses (connections), that are modulated by different chemicals that are known by the name of neurotransmitters. One of the neurotransmitter is acetylcholine.
Acetylcholine and hippocampus

Acetylcholine is associated with memory , attention, learning and sleep. It has been observed, for example, that people with Alzheimer’s disease have low levels of acetylcholine at cerebral cortex can have up to 90% less than normal people. This decrease in acetylcholine is directly responsible for memory impairment experienced by patients with Alzheimer’s.

In any case, a person has memory lapses or forgetfulness does not necessarily mean you are at the beginning of a process of dementia, most cases of memory lapses are simply due to the existence of inattention. Does having many slip indicates that our brain acetylcholine concentration is low? Nor is this relationship in 100% of cases.

Anatomical level, lapses of memory are caused by defects in the functioning of the hippocampus , the area of the brain responsible for storing our memories. You could say that the hippocampus is the “memory of our brain.” This region is involved in some psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia or depression.

Memory lapses and excess glucose

In one study, by MRI, the size of the hippocampus was correlated directly with the memory function. This study was conducted in 102 elderly, aged between 81 and 94 years, they showed that the best results in the neuropsychological tests correlated with people who had larger volumes of the hippocampus. In other words, the larger the size of our hippocampal memory works best for us. This could explain why patients with schizophrenia or depression, which have decreased the size of the hippocampus, have impaired memory.

In another study, also conducted magnetic resonance imaging in the elderly was found that the higher the concentration of glucose in the hippocampus was his worst performance, especially in an area called the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus. This area is responsible for episodic memory control-unlike similar situations and places. Alterations of the dentate gyrus is what produces the famous déjà vu (the inability to differentiate between two similar situations). The dentate gyrus is the one that plays the tricks to have the sensation of having lived there before.
Memory lapses and exercise

In a study of 60 adults aged between 60 and 80 years found that aerobic exercise (brisk walking) at least 30 minutes three times a week, increased hippocampal volume, which resulted in improved memory. Moreover, increased hippocampal volume was also associated with higher levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor.

In conclusion, limiting consumption of sugar, treating glucose intolerance and increasing aerobic exercise could limit the number of forgetfulness.

Virtually all the energy consumed comes from our brain glucose consumption is 20% of basal metabolism.

For about four decades we have accurate methods that allow us to quantify what is cerebral oxygen consumption in a living being. With this information we can calculate the energy consumption and compare it with the rest of the body (basal metabolism). So we know that the brain of a 70 kg person weighs about 1,400 g (2% of total body weight) and consumes 20% of the energy of our body. The brain is very glutton !

But what about other animals? When the same calculation is done in other animals see that your brain uses less power. Thus, the brains of our cousins ​​the monkeys consume only 9% of basal metabolism and a horse, a pig or a dog is reduced to 3%.

Another interesting aspect is that consumer spending brain power is not equal at all stages of life. In a newborn of 3,400 g weight of your brain is only about 390 g (11% of body weight) but the brain energy consumption rises to almost 50% of basal metabolism. In other words, half of what you eat goes to the brain.

What do you eat your brain?

The major brain fuel is glucose , our brain consumes about 120 g per day (about 420 Kcal). This figure is much higher than needed to meet energy needs from cerebral oxygen consumption. During prolonged fasting ketone bodies (acetoacetate and 3-hydroxybutyrate), synthesized in the liver, partly replace glucose as brain fuel.

Why do you need so much energy our brain? Most, nearly 50% – intended to keep the ions from the cells “in place” so that they can excite neurons and conduction of nerve impulses. A small part used to synthesize the proteins, neurotransmitters , etc..

Where does the brain ” for food “? The brain gets glucose from three different sources:

Foods rich in glucose.
Decomposition of carbohydrates: sugar is broken down and is delivered to the brain.
Since the liver produces glycogen and stores from the breakdown of fats and proteins.

In 2011 a group of researchers from the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda (USA) published a study in JAMA that showed that 50 minutes of mobile phone use was associated with increased metabolism glucose in the brain. The study conducted in 47 participants and found that the major effect of the metabolic abnormality was located in the brain area closest to the mobile antenna (orbitofrontal cortex and temporal pole). This finding demonstrated that our brain is sensitive to the effects of electromagnetic fields. Now, have any significance of this discovery? We do not know if this finding is of clinical importance, both in the neuronal damage as potential carcinogenic effects, we must wait for other clinical trials to evaluate these effects.
Glucose and caffeine: a good partnership

The combination of caffeine and glucose appear to be the perfect combination to study, because they improve performance on attention and working memory by increasing the efficiency of the brain areas related to these two functions. Scientific studies have shown with these two substances is decreased brain activation related to the activity in bilateral parietal cortex and left prefrontal cortex, two regions that are actively involved in the processes of attention and working memory. The decrease in brain activity, coupled with the absence of differences in behavioral performance type, suggests that the brain is more efficient since it requires less resources to get the same performance.

In short, our brain consumes a high amount of glucose daily and the union of the same to caffeine can increase your performance.

Images in thought, and afferent connections in the brain are responsible for how ideas arise. Brain process and idea generation.

Neurology .- An idea is an image that is in the mind. The idea generation process is not based on the release of any brain matter but arises as a result of joint work of both hemispheres of the brain that affect the connections between the afferent (senses) with the components of the thalamus , the cerebral cortex and the frontal region. Often arrive unexpectedly, when you least expect it.
The emergence of ideas in the brain

First of all say that the ideas are not a secretion of the brain that is not something produced by matter. Of the two cerebral hemispheres, among other functions:

The manager of creative thinking in a person is the right hemisphere.
The left hemisphere is governed by the laws of reasoning and logic. The left-brain analytical thinking does not mean that it is unnecessary with respect to the generation of ideas .

For the creation of ideas both sides of the brain (left and right) must work together to make way for the origin of a new idea. You could say that ideas are the result of the ceaseless activity of the unconscious.
How ideas are born? Idea generation process

The ideas are formed following a sensory image stored in the brain, in other words:

With each passing second comes information (afferent) to the brain through the senses (sights, sounds, smells, …).
This information is stored in the head and arranged in the mind leads to the formation of ideas . Recall that the mind is the “mother of ideas” but that they are part of it.

In this process of thought, the brain acts as a receiver and decoder converts this information in words. This is a process which is influenced by:

The connections between the afferent (senses) with the components of the thalamus and the cerebral cortex.
The frontal region. Influential in the area of the brain and emotions in human behavior .

Why ideas come at unexpected times?

A person best expresses your cognitive knowledge when you are relaxed, when nothing can alter your free will. The thoughts and creative ideas are the result of deep thought, without alterations of any kind.

According to Dr. Carlos Tejero corroborates, member of the Spanish Society of Neurology “the brain has its own filter that helps you organize and set priorities within our consciousness. So while we are with things at that time occupied the most powerful of our consciousness, the brain goes to work on other issues but at a level not to perceive … However, when we sleep, when we relax or distract us from what has been a priority until then is when they come to our consciousness issues that we had left parked but had always been there. “

The thin men would be more likely to attempt suicide than those who are overweight, according to a new study that confirms a confusing relationship between weight and risk of suicide.
The first study of this relationship in the United States in 1966 and since then, the investigation concluded that a higher body weight, fewer suicides. Most research has focused on men, but the same was observed in women.

A connection is unclear, the authors argue, because other studies showed a higher rate of depression in the obese, who have more health problems. A new look for this relationship was published in American Journal of Epidemiology, from the largest study so far: decades of following more than 1 million men in Sweden to which they had performed physical examinations between 1969 and 1994 for military service.
The team used these records to calculate body mass index (BMI) of men and used the registration of a national hospital discharge to detect suicide attempts in the group until 2006.
In 24 years, 18,277 men (1.6 percent) were admitted to hospital for attempted suicide. That amount, according to body weight, showed only small differences: the 2 percent of men with low weight during the study attempted suicide, compared with 1.6 percent of participants with normal weight and 1.5 percent of men are overweight.

But the team found a pattern between BMI and relative risk of making a suicide attempt, the men with overweight / obesity were 12 percent less likely to try the group with normal weight, while men were underweight 12 percent more likely to do so.

After analyzing all ranges of BMI, the authors found that even among normal weight men, the possibility of suicide decreased as BMI grew. This pattern was evident in men without depression during the draft and was maintained after considering new diagnoses of depression during follow-up. While the results support previous findings, the causes are still unknown, the researchers said Finn Rasmussen, of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm.

The main strength of the study is focused on healthy young people, in which a low BMI could not be attributed to a disease, said Dr. Kenneth J. Mukamal of Harvard University and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. To Mukamal, who wrote an editorial accompanying the study, it is still possible that depression has a role in the relationship BMI-suicide. It is possible, he said, that men are more likely thinner than those who are overweight to opt for suicide methods which require more physical ability and are more lethal, such as hanging or jumping from. Another possibility, he said, is that larger bodies require higher drug overdose or drugs to be fatal enough.

There are about 600 diseases that affect the brain. And it is striking that those who are more dangerous to our brain that tell us more. Parkinson, for example, takes 18,000 lives each year. This disease has taught us how the brain controls our body.

Knowledge of the mechanisms of memory are clear in Alzheimer’s disease. And by stroke researchers learned to keep isolated the damaged brain cells. In the most serious diseases are the best opportunities for science.

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When the origin of a physical problem has its starting point in a psychological aspect, then we speak of psychosomatic disorders.

In this blog we tell health details of a problem estimated to affect about 30% of patients who seek medical care.

Have physical symptoms and not knowing where they come from. Try everything to solve these problems but nothing that can not be solved.

In many cases, when a patient has physical problems, often have a psychological origin and we are talking about a psychosomatic disorder.

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Seldom can study the role of different parts of the brain with as much accuracy as when an individual is totally devoid of such structure or their action, something rare. But that is the case of a U.S. citizen known by the initials SM, who suffers from a rare condition that caused the two tonsils were destroyed and lives without fear.

These structures (located one in each hemisphere of the brain) are formed by thousands of cores, as part of the limbic system, involved in regulating emotions. Among them, the fear. Animal studies from rats to monkeys, have shown that the amygdala is crucial to terror, from processing to recognition and induction of a response. “But little is known about its role in inducing aware of behaviors related to fear,” the authors write in the journal Current Biology. Read the rest of this entry »