Dana Foundation Blog

New Cerebrum Article: Musical Creativity and the Brain

In a new Cerebrum article, Dana grantee Charles Limb, faculty member at The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and the Peabody Conservatory of Music, and postdoctoral fellow Mónica López-González describe their research into musical creativity and the brain.

They are using brain imaging to study the neural underpinnings of spontaneous artistic creativity, from jazz riffs to freestyle rap. So far, they have found that brain areas deactivated during improvisation are also at rest during dreaming and meditation, while activated areas include those controlling language and sensorimotor skills. Even with relatively few completed studies, researchers have concluded that musical creativity cannot be tied to just one brain area or process.

As Limb and López-González conclude, there is much left to study—they would like research to branch out into visual and performing arts to “formulate a more generalizable theory on artistic creativity.”

To see video of jazz musicians and hip-hop freestylers in an fMRI scanner, watch Dr. Limb’s TED talk.

--Johanna Goldberg

BAW Events Help Dyslexic Students

Our guest blogger is Marilyn Cook, a Brain Awareness Week partner and professional educational therapist who works as a reading/district dyslexia specialist for K-12 students in the Port Aransas Independent School District.

“Wow…I didn’t know that was a picture of the brain.”

“I want to learn more about this.”

“This is so cool.”

“I can’t believe these students can do this.”

What could these people be talking about? Why Brain Awareness Week, of course!

About three years ago, my interest in neuroscience led me to surf the web and find a treasure trove of information about the brain and an exciting opportunity to become a partner in an international brain awareness campaign sponsored by the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives. The organization’s website has excellent resources, and combined with some imagination, the possibilities to teach about the brain and how it functions are endless. With a generous grant from The Port Aransas Educational Foundation, I was able to develop the Brain Awareness Week (BAW) initiative Neuroscience for Kids: The Mind That’s Mine for my students and my schools.

A goal I have for my students is for them to figure out their best individual learning styles. In the words of a school staff member, “[the students] are proud and they own their challenges.” To help accomplish my goal, I use kid-friendly resources from Dana such as Brainy Kids Online and the Its Mindbloggling! booklets, as well as the website Neuroscience for Kids from the University of Washington. Several teachers and the counselor of the middle and elementary schools have commented how the students that participate in brain awareness activities have become more confident in their abilities and are more patient with students who struggle.

BAW began early with this year with our lunch and learn program at the Brundrett Middle School. The students I work with have dyslexia and other learning challenges, so we have been meeting and discussing how our brains work. During our first lunch, students were already asking about our next BAW activity.

At one of our presentation luncheons at H.G. Olsen Elementary School, we hosted local pediatrician Dr. Lori Anderson and our school counselor Jeri Franco for discussions on how the brain works and dyslexia. Dr. Anderson even made a brain out of Jell-O, which the students thought was the “coolest thing.”

     

An integral part of our BAW program is student displays. Students from the Brundrett Middle School have exhibited posters about the brain at several venues, including the Brundrett Middle School libraries and the Bill Ellis Memorial Library (Port Aransas city library). Poster topics have included learning challenges as a strength (featuring many famous people with dyslexia) and a comparison of the brain activity of two reading students; one with dyslexia and one without.

In 2011, the Port Aransas Independent School District partnered with the Art Center for the Islands and provided students grades 3-7 with activities based on the theme, Your Brain on Art and Reading. This idea was based on a study from the Dana Foundation on the brain and the visual arts. Over the course of a week, students studied the brain and what happens when they read and when they view visual art. One particular project that the students completed was to draw the brain with an acetate overlay showing how the brain activates when looking at images from art history. They also participated in creative activities with two guest artists, using colored dyes and colored chalk. At the end of the week, a student art show was held and the students discussed their brains in relation to the art they created. These activities have resulted in an increased interest in student art classes and in conversations about how we learn.

BAW has been a wonderful learning initiative for both me and my students. And we’re not the only ones who benefit from the experience. I feel that the school community and the surrounding community have also benefitted from BAW. We have increased awareness of dyslexia, including dispelling certain myths, and through lessons on brain function, we have promoted the idea that people learn in diverse ways.

-- Marilyn Cook

Social Media as Science Facilitator

The four panelists at “Beyond a Trend: Enhancing Science Communication with Social Media,” an event hosted by the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) and Science Online NYC (SoNYC) for Social Media Week and moderated by The New York Times Science News Editor Jennifer Kingson, may use social media in different ways, but they all agree that social media creates a new culture around science.

Ruth Cohen, senior director of education initiatives and director of the Center for Lifelong Learning at the AMNH, described several of the museum’s forays into social media. Museum researchers now tweet and make videos about their research. Adults attending monthly science cafes ask scientists questions during the event—turning a one-way conversation into a two-way conversation—and tweet questions to an even larger audience, further broadening the discussion.

Perhaps most notably, middle school students taking part in the Urban Biodiversity Network use smartphones to document the biodiversity around them. The project successfully engaged students who might otherwise have been uninterested in scientific exploration. In another student initiative, participants from an AMNH after school program had a “dynamic and groundbreaking” conversation about sustainability with students from Global Kids on Second Life. The students found an online community while speaking with others with similar interests, all the while practicing scientific discourse.  

On the whole, said Cohen, “Students are learning from their documentation, sharing, and conversations. They develop a scientific interest.” The projects “democratize and demystify science.”

Online science projects have taken off for adults, too, and with impressive results. Participants in Galaxy Zoo added value to raw data from the Hubble telescope; they read up on spectroscopy to understand what they were seeing and published papers as a result. Participants playing the protein-folding game FoldIt have solved real-world problems, like determining the structure of a virus that causes AIDS in monkeys.

Both crowdsourcing and individual voices play a role in bringing science to non-scientists. Through the Story Collider, Ben Lillie works to “normalize science.” The Story Collider invites people to get up on stage (in a “bar basement with no cell reception”) to share true stories of how science has affected their lives. The stories then go out via podcast to an even larger audience.

Lillie began the Story Collider as a way to explore the interaction of science and culture. It “gets people thinking about their own lives,” said Lillie—people hear others’ stories and become motivated to send in their own experiences. “The conversation is happening constantly,” he said.

Matt Danzico has brought people into the conversation through shock value. Last year, Danzico, a staff reporter and video journalist at BBC News, spent his time away from the office working on Time Hack, a blog where he wrote about doing something new every day—from streaking to becoming an ordained minister—and estimated how long each activity took. At the end of 2011, he compared his estimates with the actual amount of time elapsed, and found he had overestimated the year by more than 14 hours. Throughout these hijinks (including a very popular invitation to readers to estimate how long it took them to unravel a roll of toilet paper), Danzico included the “science nuggets behind the activities.”

Carl Zimmer found another way to bring science to readers—through tattoos. When Zimmer put a call out to people to send him pictures of science-related ink, he had no idea what the outcome would be: Zimmer became a “tattoo curator” and author of Science Ink. When they read the book, said Zimmer, “People don’t think they are reading about science, just that scientists are really strange.”

Zimmer’s blog, The Loom, has also opened the scientific conversation to non-scientists. One popular blog post on blue whales’ cancer defenses prompted many readers to ask questions. Zimmer went back to the two scientists who did the research—they agreed to answer every question.

As a rule, said Cohen, “Social media is not a thoughtful environment. [Scientists and science communicators] have to make it that way.”

--Johanna Goldberg

High School Bioethics Project Launches New Website

Bioethics is a growing sphere in the science community and Arthur Caplan, Ph.D., and his colleagues at the High School Bioethics Project (HSBP) at the University of Pennsylvania have been working to bring high school students into the mix.  Since 2001, they’ve developed curriculums, web resources, and outreach programs to increase conversations about bioethics in high school classrooms. In 2007, the Dana Foundation awarded Caplan a three-year grant to develop classroom materials as part of HSBP, something he spoke about with us in a 2010 interview.

In HSBP’s efforts to connect to a wider group, today it launched a newly designed website with topical briefs, related news coverage, and a calendar of upcoming events (none posted as of today, though). The briefs seem to be the main attraction, addressing areas such a bioethics and sports, clinical ethics, and public health ethics, and are developed for teachers to help supplement their lessons.

--Ann L. Whitman

From the Archives: Love and Lust in the Brain

Since love is on the brain today, it seemed the perfect opportunity to look back at Dana’s articles on love, lust, and attraction. The selected articles span more than a decade, and included in the mix is a Cerebrum piece from Rutgers’ anthropologist Helen Fisher, who is something of a go-to love expert for the media and is sure to be quoted in numerous articles today.

Brains Do It: Lust, Attraction, and Attachment
By Helen E. Fisher
January 01, 2000  

With classic understatement, anthropologist Helen Fisher suggests that the three emotional systems—lust, attraction, and attachment—“are somewhat disconnected in human beings...” But the situation is not hopeless, Fisher argues; the role of the prefrontal cortex in humans is to control and direct these emotions—if we so choose.

Neurobiology Affects Love and Attraction
By Kathlyn Stone
January 02, 2009  

Research presented at the 2008 Society for Neuroscience meeting revealed aspects of what happens in the brain of someone feeling intense love, as well as the sensory and molecular processes involved in love and mating.

The Chemistry of Love: In Search of the Elusive Human Pheromones
By Brenda Patoine
February, 2009

Chemical messages wafting off other people’s bodies clearly influence sexual attraction and mating behavior in humans. Just don’t call them pheromones - yet. 

The Brain Signature of Love
By Kayt Sukel
February 10, 2011

Neuroscientists are demonstrating that romantic love is represented by a unique pattern of activation in the brain.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

-Ann L. Whitman

Love and Other (Gateway) Drugs

How do you keep things fresh in a relationship after 55 years of marriage? If you are prolific Columbia University scientists Eric and Denise Kandel, you collaborate on a research project for the first time.

While every neuroscience undergraduate knows Nobel Laureate Eric Kandel, his wife, Denise, has some serious science chops of her own. A professor of sociomedical science at Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health, Denise’s main research interests center on risk factors and consequences of drug use. Decades of epidemiological research suggested that smoking acted as a gateway to harder drugs. After hearing Eric give a lecture on cocaine, plasticity, and histone acetylation, she wondered if perhaps an epigenetic model might help explain the relationship between nicotine and cocaine addiction.

“That’s how the whole thing started, really. It triggered this idea,” she says. “And it is important to mention because I think that oftentimes a scientific collaboration or scientific success arises out of a chance event and a prepared mind.”

Still, she didn’t ask her husband to collaborate on this particular “chance event” at first. “I didn’t think he was interested,” she says matter-of-factly. So, instead, she asked him to recommend a few other scientists who might want to collaborate. None of them were available.

“I don’t know why but Denise had trouble coming up with another collaborator,” Eric says. “But as we discussed it more, I felt the problem was interesting so, at that point, I stepped in. But it was the failure to come up with another collaborator that really encouraged me to try it.”

The study, heralded as a landmark experiment by both the neurobiological and epidemiological communities, demonstrated for the first time how nicotine can act as a “gateway,” accelerating the cellular and epigenetic processes that facilitate drug addiction (see Dana's story about it).

When I asked the Kandels how well their personal partnership translated to one in the lab, Eric laughed. “It was difficult at the beginning. Denise asked a lot of questions that I felt were interfering with my own line of thought,” he said. “But I soon realized that I needed to hear those questions. That’s the point of collaboration. You pick two very different approaches to address a problem. Once I realized that, we fell into step.”

“Eric was exasperated because I said we needed to do more work on the figures for the paper,” she says. “But he admits now that I was right. The figures look very good.”

“Yes, they do,” he says. “The figures look very good.”

And any advice to other couples on the brink of scientific collaboration?

“It’s been very exciting to work together,” says Denise. “But it’s not easy.”

“I don’t think one can give general advice to the lovelorn here,” Eric adds. “We’re both strong, independent people and I think, in any collaboration with two strong, independent people, there’s going to be some awkwardness initially. But I have a sense of enormous satisfaction that we accomplished this together. And I’m glad that we’re continuing on together.”

The two are currently working on a study to see whether alcohol results in a similar gateway mechanism. And they hope to later examine marijuana, too. And while the two are excited by the scientific possibilities, they admit they are pleased to have the chance to work together, too.

“It’s wonderful to be able to spend this time together,” says Eric. “And it’s wonderful to finally have a way to look at these questions about gateway drugs. I’m hoping that our collaboration will inspire a whole new field of translational epidemiology.”

What better Valentine could a scientific couple ask for?

--Kayt Sukel

Sukel's first book, Dirty Minds: How our brains influence love, sex, and relationships, is available now.

Brainwave: Welcome to Connectome

Last night, New York City’s Rubin Museum (a new Brain Awareness Week partner!) drew a full house for its Brainwave program “Welcome to Connectome.” Dateline NBC's Jane Pauley and MIT Computational Neuroscience Professor Sebastian Seung, Ph.D., treated the audience to a discussion about the daunting task of mapping the brain and how this effort can lead to a better understanding of the biological basis of identity.

The connectome, according to Seung, is “the complete map of all the neural connections in your brain.” Each connectome is unique, he said, shaped by genes and over time by experience. Scientists hope that mapping these connections will lead to a better understanding of the origins of behavior and mental disorders, resulting in earlier treatments (see Dana’s recent article “Beyond the Connectome”).

With more than 100 billion neurons making connections in the human brain, you can imagine what a large undertaking this project is. Mapping involves tracing paths of the wiring and synapses in the brain, said Seung, and because of the density, it is done one cubic millimeter at a time.

Seung and his colleagues invite members of the public to help expedite the color-mapping process, by participating on their website eyewire.org, designed by Seung’s students at MIT. In a recent MIT News article, Seung explained the process, “The person can click the mouse and say ‘color here,’ and the computer starts coloring again, and keeps going, and then stops again when it’s uncertain. So you’re guiding the computer.” This is a far better use of your computer time than playing solitaire!

While citizen scientists are aiding his research, Seung hopes that they will take away something in return. He believes access to eyewire will help “empower people to learn about the brain.” Not to mention the program has a funky, slightly hypnotic element to it, for those of you drawn to that sort of thing.

All in all, it’s clear that scientists in the connectomics field really have their work cut out for them, but with enthusiastic researchers like Seung, it’s hard not to get excited about the possibilities. As neuropsychologist Susan Bookheimer said in a recent Wall Street Journal article, “[t]he study of connectivity is as hot as hot can get.”

To learn more about the connectome, watch Seung’s 2010 TED Talk. Seung also has a new book, “Connectome: How the Brain’s Wiring Makes Us Who We Are.” He participated in an author talk at Harvard earlier this week, which is available in video online.

--Ann L. Whitman

NYC Brain Bee a Big Success

The New York City Regional Brain Bee, for the first time, was more than just a neuroscience quiz for high school students. The competition was the main purpose, of course, and Staten Island Technical High School’s Danling Chen beat 45 other competitors to claim the top prize: $500 and a trip to the University of Maryland for the National Brain Bee.

But there was also a lecture from Charles Zuker, Ph.D., and a Brain Fair for the students and other Bee attendees. All of this took place at Alfred Lerner Hall on Columbia University’s campus. Zooker’s presentation, aided by entertaining and informative PowerPoint slides, focused on two of the five senses: sight and taste. To illustrate sight, he showed video clips of a bat tracking a moth in pitch dark. I learned that dogs do in fact see certain colors (I had always been told they only see in black and white). For the most point, canines’ interpretation of colors is duller than ours. As Zuker noted, this is another example of how color is not in the real world but in our minds, and is open to interpretation. I think this is what the movie Pleasantville was about. 

One of Zuker’s videos about taste showed a mouse getting rewarded with a tasty liquid and therefore associating a particular stimulus with the reward. Suddenly the liquid was tainted with a foul ingredient, and the mouse’s reaction—closing its eyes, turning away in disgust—drew a sympathetic “Awww” from the audience. Should that same mouse appear in their homes, I’m guessing they’d have a different reaction.

Zuker is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator, and according to his HHMI bio, he attended college at 16 and started graduate school at MIT at 20 (he's now in his 50's). I’m 25 and consider successful preparation of EZ Mac an accomplishment.

Zuker’s presentation was followed by the Bee itself. This was my third Brain Bee and I am always amazed by the knowledge of the participants. These kids really know their stuff. When nearly all of them correctly answered “100 billion” for the approximate number of nerve cells in the human brain, the Bee’s first question, I knew they were using every last one of them. In addition to our coverage, The New York Times also had a reporter at the event.

After the winners were determined, students and their supporters were encouraged to step into the hallway for a Brain Fair. Attendees could see, but not touch, a human brain. (One unnamed Dana employee inadvertently touched the brain and was ordered to wash his hands immediately.) There were some student experiments on display as well, and some posters with titles difficult to read, yet alone understand. There were distortion goggles, which can be used to show the plasticity of the brain—toss a bean bag to the left of your intended target enough times and your brain will correct itself and aim a few feet to the right.

The pre- and post-Bee events really made for a wonderful afternoon of neuroscience. If you missed this year’s event, be sure to stop by next year to see if a Staten Island Tech student wins for the third straight year!

--Andrew Kahn

Brain Oddities: Reading Rainbow

Yesterday, a coworker showed me an interesting internet phenomenon that I’d seen some years before but had completely forgotten. You may recognize it from when it began circulating via email in 2003 (you know, those chain emails that threatened horrible things if you didn't forward them):

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

I, like most people who read this, found it incredibly interesting, and decided to investigate further. It turns out that, although this passage holds a few grains of truth, there are a few substantial errors.

The first issue with the passage is that, according to an actual language researcher at Cambridge University, while there are several groups at the school studying language, this particular topic was not being investigated at the time of the passage’s release. The second problem is its claim that the middle letters can be in any order without affecting reading comprehension—this is only partially true. Take, for example, the following sentences:

1. Big ccunoil tax ineesacrs tihs yaer hvae seezueqd the inmcoes of mnay pneosenirs

2. A dootcr has aimttded the magltheuansr of a tageene ceacnr pintaet who deid aetfr a hatospil durg blender

You probably found these two sentences much more difficult to read than the first example (if you got stuck, you can check the translations at the bottom of this post). There are several potential reasons why the “Cambridge University” passage is easier to read: firstly, the words in the passage still largely maintain the shape of the correct word; secondly, the distance between where the letters actually belong and where they have been displaced is usually small. For example, the “bridge" in “Cambridge” (“Cmabrigde”) remains largely unchanged, so it’s easy for us to infer the entire word based on our recognition of “bridge.”

Although we usually do not read letter-by-letter, as claimed in the passage, we also do not necessarily process each word as a whole. There are a variety of factors that allow us to read efficiently. As mentioned above, one theory holds that we attend to the shapes of words (that is, letter placement) as part of our visual processing. Additionally, one-, two-, and three-letter words are often skipped entirely, so our reading is not as linear as one might think:

(Credit: Kevin Larson)

The arrows represent saccades, or short eye movements, analyzed with an eye-tracking device. The eye skips over the small words and, in the case of the last sentence, sometimes doubles back. Another interesting thing to note is that when we read,

You probably deciphered the first half of that to say “we focus on the top of the letters,” but you probably couldn’t tell (apart from context) that the second half says “rather than the bottom.” This could either be an efficiency tactic or a by-product of the fact that the top halves of letters appear to be more distinctive than the bottom halves.

Unfortunately, I was unable to find any studies that shed light on the neural underpinnings of reading comprehension tactics. But discovering that reading is a much more complicated process than I thought made me feel marginally better about the shame I endured when stumbling through passages that I was forced to read aloud in grade school. I’m gald thsoe dyas are gnoe.

--Caitlin Schneider

Translation Answers:

1. Big council tax increases this year have squeezed the incomes of many pensioners.

2. A doctor has admitted the manslaughter of a teenage cancer patient who died after a hospital drug blunder.

Source: Larson, Kevin. 2004. The Science of Word Recognition.

Brain Bee Challenge: Round IV

Tis the Brain Bee season and in honor of the hard-studying New York high school students who are spending this Saturday afternoon being quizzed on the brain, we’re bringing you our fourth installment of the Brain Bee Challenge.

The Challenge is based on actual questions from previous Brain Bee competitions (live Q&A contests that test high school students about neuroscience), which take place all over the world as part of Brain Awareness Week. The regional and national competitions lead to the International Brain Bee, which will be held in South Africa in July. Pretty impressive, right?

So, you may want to put on your homemade thinking cap and get focused. Here’s Round IV. You need 8 out of 10 correct to advance.

--Ann L. Whitman

The Circuitry of Vision

Colloquially, the eyes are the window to the soul. Biologically, they may be the key to enhancing scientific understanding of the brain’s neural circuits.

At an event co-sponsored by the German Center for Research and Innovation and the Max Planck Florida Institute, Joshua Sanes, a member of the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiative and professor at Harvard University, and David Fitzpatrick, scientific director and CEO of the Max Planck Florida Institute, explained their research into the circuitry of the retina and the visual cortex.

Their research brings into focus the roles genetics and environment play in shaping neural circuitry.

As Dr. Sanes explained, the retina is complicated but compact, making it “a playground for figuring out how circuits work.” Three layers of cells make up the retina: photoreceptors, which sense light; interneurons, which process information between the layers; and retinal ganglion cells, which respond to movement, orientation, color contrast, and edges. There are at least 50 types of interneurons and retinal ganglion cells, and only a few connect to each other, forming parallel pathways for communicating visual information.

Using a fluorescent protein, Sanes’ lab marked the gene Jam-B, which only appears in a small number of mouse retinal ganglion cells. They found that the dendrites of these cells all had the same orientation, and that the axons all pointed toward the center of the retina. They all respond to motion moving in the direction of their dendrites.

Stained Jam-B RGC dendrites pointing in the same direction, with axons going toward the center of the retina. (Credit: In-Jung Kim and Joshua Sanes, 2008)

“It’s rare that you can determine function from structure,” said Sanes. But these cells—and at least nine other types of retinal ganglion cells now identified by scientists—are genetically hard-wired to respond to particular directions of motion.

In contrast, said Fitzpatrick, experience can shape the responses of cells and circuits in the visual cortex.

Using two-photon in vivo microscopy, an imaging technique that allows researchers to study brain activity in living animals, Fitzpatrick looked at direction-selectivity emergence in individual neurons in the ferret cortex. Ferrets are not born with direction-selective cortical cells—there is a critical window for their development soon after birth.

Fitzpatrick and his colleagues presented visually naïve ferrets with a motion stimulus while recording their neuronal activity. After eight to ten hours of training, direction signals correlating to the direction of the stimulus began to form. “Experience was driving circuit emergence,” said Fitzpatrick.

Some cortical cells do show a weak bias toward one direction over another when shown a bidirectional object; there may be some genetic-experience interaction at play. Still, no one yet knows why experience molds cortical cells, while genetics alone drives retinal cells. But clearly, the imaging techniques now available to neuroscientists—like two-photon microscopy and fluorescent proteins—will help answer these questions while unraveling the brain’s neural circuitry.

--Johanna Goldberg

Brain Bee Study Sessions a Success

Our guest blogger is Florence Varodayan, a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior at Columbia University. Florence helped organize two study sessions in preparation for Saturday's New York City Regional Brain Bee Competition.

If a patient comes to a hospital ER complaining of general weakness and a “clumsy” right hand, what would you, the doctor, do? What tests would you perform to diagnose the patient?

This scenario was presented to high school students preparing for the NYC Regional Brain Bee by a Columbia University M.D./Ph.D. student. The ensuing discussion covered the topics of identifying different causes of movement disorders and interpreting the results of neurological tests. The final diagnosis, after an MRI scan, was multiple sclerosis.

The Brain Bee is an international competition that aims to inspire the next generation of neuroscientists by teaching them about the brain. The Dana Alliance has been running the NYC area competition since 2002, and this year decided to bring the Brain Bee to Columbia University by teaming up with two student groups: the undergraduate group, the Columbia Neuroscience Society; and the graduate student group, Columbia University Neuroscience Outreach. The 2012 NYC Regional Brain Bee will be held from 1-5 pm on Saturday February 4^th, at Roone Arledge Auditorium, Alfred Lerner Hall, Columbia University.

To help the participants prepare for the competition, Columbia undergraduate and graduate students hosted two workshops in January. At the first workshop, held on Columbia’s medical campus, neuroscience graduate students gave presentations on each of the key areas covered in the competition. The competitors learned things as varied as how optical illusions work, what happens when we sleep, and what approaches scientists are taking to model the brain. What made these presentations truly special is that the graduate students discussed material directly related to what they study in the lab. As a result, the presenters were delighted to answer the competitors’ numerous and often complex questions. In fact, several of the graduate students later commented to me on the passion and intelligence of the competitors. Several told me, “We weren’t that smart back when we were in high school!”

Two weeks later, the Brain Bee participants attended a second workshop at Columbia’s main campus to engage with neuroscience as a process that involves investigation, discussion, and often a lot of controversy. The competitors learned how to diagnose patients with neurological disorders and then viewed (and touched!) real human and animal brains. They also discussed the scientific and legal ramifications of several neuroethics case studies with Columbia undergraduate and graduate students.

In one scenario, students were presented with a case study modeled after the issue of whether Science & Nature should release all the details of the controversial H5N1 study, while risking the information landing in the hands of bioterrorists. Another case, about the potential use of memory-enhancing drugs in preparation for a test, was particularly contentious. Some students pointed out that if the goal of (illegally) using drugs such as Adderall is merely to improve concentration, using a substance that has similar effects, such as coffee, could be a viable (legal) alternative. The day ended on a high note with tours of some of Columbia’s neuroscience research laboratories.

Thank you to all the wonderful undergraduate and graduate student volunteers who organized and ran these workshop sessions. We are really excited to celebrate neuroscience next Saturday and wish all the Brain Bee competitors good luck!

--Florence Varodayan

The Power of Data

Once a scientist has finished her research and published a paper, where is that data stored?

Three of the panelists at Science Online New York City (SONYC)’s event last night, “Thinking Digital: Giving your research more reach (and making sure others can find it),” are figuring out answers to this question.

Carol Feltes, Rockefeller University’s head librarian, comes from a business background. In a for-profit setting, there are clear policies and procedures for data management, retention, and removal. But at Rockefeller, each lab head is responsible for his or her data—there is no overarching policy for data management.

The library encourages lab heads to store data on its DSpace, “a managed, digital repository designed to archive, preserve and make accessible the scholarly works authored by The Rockefeller University faculty, staff and students.” So far, only six labs have started using the open-access repository. “Unless they absolutely need it, we can’t sell it,” Feltes said.

There are also data storage solutions outside institutional settings. The new repository Figshare invites researchers to post research data, both publically and privately, under a creative commons license (materials can used with proper attribution). Figshare developer Mark Hahnel finished his Ph.D. in September, and during the process realized that most of his research would never be seen outside of his lab group—much of it was negative, or simply didn’t fit into the larger research picture. He wanted to share and get credit for all his research, and found that existing online places to store and share data were too difficult to use. Thus, Figshare was born. Hahnel hopes that the visible metrics on the site, tracking page views, shares, and citations, will encourage people to post their research.

Efforts are also underway to make published literature available. One such undertaking is the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL), a consortium of 12 libraries digitizing all published biodiversity literature. To date, said Cathy Norton, library scholar at BHL and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Library, 32 million pages—or 6.5 percent of the literature—has been scanned. Much of that material predates 1923, and is no longer under copyright. In addition, publishers have given the project materials to scan.

But once these materials are available, how can people find them? Rare and old works do not have DOIs or ISBNs, and digitizers must add metadata and discoverability tools. The next step, said Norton, it to contextualize data, providing a story regarding what the collection is all about.

Clearly, research tools are changing as more information becomes available. And, if used well, this could change the speed of science. As Feltes said, “People begin to realize that with greater access to a greater variety [of data], the pace of knowledge generation increases. Having data available accelerates the pace at which problems are solved and disparate disciplines are stitched together.”

--Johanna Goldberg

Changing the Diagnoses

It's not a surprise that each time researchers and other experts revise the "bible" of psychiatric diagnosis in America, they change categories and definitions of disabilities. But when that change hits close to home—say, narrowing the definition of autism spectrum disorder—it gets a lot more press than usual.

The next edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), which psychiatrists and other practitioners use as a guide to diagnose psychiatric disorders, is in the late stages of a long revision process; it goes to the printers in December. Many of the suggested changes have been posted for comment for the past year. This past week, The New York Times weighed in on two proposed changes.

In "New Definition of Autism Will Exclude Many, Study Suggests," writer Benedict Carey describes a recent analysis by Dr. Fred Volkmar that estimates how many people now classified as having Asperger's syndrome or "pervasive developmental disorder, not otherwise specified" (PDD-NOS) would not qualify as autistic under the proposed guidelines. Without the "autistic" label, these people might not qualify for extra help at school; insurers might not cover their therapy. Small wonder people started to panic (at least in the comments on the Times story). Still, as Gil Tippy of the Rebecca School in New York advised on the Thinking Person's Guide to Autism site, "If you, or your son or daughter has an appropriate diagnosis on the Autism Spectrum now, responsible clinicians will find that you or your children meet the criteria for Autism Spectrum Disorder under the new guidelines."

Another change highlighted this week would add "grief and grieving" to the list of criteria used to diagnose depression (writer Benedict Carey also mentions other changes, too). A lively discussion follows on the Times's Well blog.

Back in 2009, when discussion about the DSM-5 was starting to roll, we invited the scientists leading the revision process to describe their plan. Their essay, for our Cerebrum periodical, may not have been one of our better-read pieces at the time, but has grown in interest since. We paired it with a call from Johns Hopkins psychiatry professor Paul R. McHugh that the editors focus on disorders’ causes and disease processes, in part to improve upon what the two most recent editions of DSM have produced: “a psychiatry that’s boring.”

Early in 2011, former Harvard provost Steven E. Hyman weighed in for Cerebrum on how the process was going—his title: "Diagnostic Classification Needs Fundamental Reform." (Hyman is a member of the DSM revision task force, but was writing as an individual.) In his argument, he acknowledges that radical reform may need more time (i.e., the 10 years until DSM-6). In terms of individual diagnostic categories, though, "I would recommend that the DSM-5 take a conservative approach, leaving criteria unchanged unless compelling new evidence suggests that a change would be beneficial. Whatever the ultimate approach to the DSM-5, it is critical that the scientific community escape the artificial diagnostic silos that control so much research, ultimately to our detriment."

(Also, Seth Mnookin has posted a great roundtable discussion on the image of autism, including who speaks for autistic people and how the spectrum is covered by the media.)

--Nicky Penttila

From the Archives: Suicide Prevention

In this month’s Cerebrum article, “Suicide and the United States Army,” Dr. Elspeth Cameron Ritchie, a retired Army colonel, explains how the U.S. Military now collects data on suicides. She recommends ways to put that data to use through new strategies—like means restriction and service animals—that could bring down the high suicide rate in the military.

In July of 2011, Kay Redfield Jamison wrote the Cerebrum article “Suicide in the Young: An Essay.” She said:

“We know, first, that suicide is a terrible killer of the young. In the United States, suicide is the third major cause of death in 15-to-19-year-olds and the second leading cause of death in college-age students. In 1996, more teenagers and young adults died from suicide than from cancer, heart disease, AIDS, stroke, and lung disease combined. Suicide kills the young dreadfully and disproportionately. And, across the world, in those between the ages of 15 and 44, suicide is the second leading killer of women and the fourth of men.”

These numbers have not changed much. According to the CDC, suicide is still the third leading cause of death for 15-24 year olds, and for every completed suicide in this age range, there are 100-200 unsuccessful suicide attempts.

Dr. Ritchie says in her new article that military suicide differs from civilian suicide in part due to the role of mental illness. Most soldiers who commit suicide have not been diagnosed with a mental illness, although substance abuse issues can be a factor. She writes that an accumulation of stressors, like pain, disability, and estrangement from friends and family are more common risk factors among active duty personnel.

In contrast, in the civilian population, writes Dr. Jamison:

“We have compelling evidence from a large number of studies that the single most important factor in suicide is psychopathology: More than 90 percent of all people who kill themselves suffered from a major psychiatric or addictive illness (depression, manic-depression, schizophrenia, or alcohol and drug abuse), a severe anxiety disorder, or borderline or antisocial personality disorder. Those who are victims of both depression and alcohol or drug abuse are especially at risk. Most people who were depressed will not kill themselves. But of those who do, the majority were profoundly depressed.”

This, too, remains true today.

So what can be done to prevent suicide in the civilian population? The National Institute for Mental Health recommends treating underlying disorders, like depression and substance abuse, while addressing suicide risks. Studies have shown that cognitive behavior therapy can effectively reduce the number of suicide attempts. A combination of medication and therapy may be even more effective. In addition, primary care physicians should be better trained to recognize warning signs of suicide.

If someone you know talks to you about suicide, take him or her seriously. Call 911 or the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).

--Johanna Goldberg

Learning About Learning

How does school work, brain-wise? Do children teach themselves or is it something about the instruction that gets their brains firing and wiring faster? Last fall, a few hundred neuroscientists, teachers, and curriculum-makers met for a weekend to hash out what we know about learning and how we could use it to help every child succeed at school. One early answer: Play. 

The Aspen Brain Forum was sponsored by the New York Academy of Sciences, which has posted an extensive summary of the event as well as slides and audio from eighteen of the sessions. For an introductory taste of the event, though, try the 18-min podcast (which we sponsored). Science and the City's Nadja Popovich talked with three of the presenters, who sketch the growing field and describe a few surprising results.  

Many of these results are connected to the cognitive properties of executive function, especially attention: inhibiting distraction, focusing on the correct aspect of a task, and maintaining focus. For example, Adele Diamond of the University of British Columbia describes the "red-pencil technique" for children who are writing their letters or numbers the wrong way (mirrored). Asking them to remind themselves to stop before they have to write a "6" and switch from their regular pencil to another one to write that number slows them down enough that they write the number correctly, a change that seems to last. Diamond also points out that learning programs that include social, emotional, and physical components (such as play) "are better for academic achievement and executive function" than those that focus solely on academics. "Addressing only the cognitive seems to be less beneficial," she says.

On the subject of play, Daphne Bavalier of the University of Rochester offers tantalizing research into the benefits of often-denigrated video games. Studies done on undergraduate non-gamers who played games for the first time for a few dozen hours seem to show they have improved vision acuity and speed as well as attention. How might programmers tweak games to foster improvements that could last?

Bruce McCandliss of Vanderbilt University describes research that suggests that differences in learning abilities and styles may have a grounding in attention, too—or rather, what we focus our attention on. Brain scans of young people focusing on the beginnings and endings of spoken words differ in predictable ways from the scans of those who focus on the melody of the sentences, for example. Might "poor" readers be focusing on a less-helpful aspect of the language, perhaps enjoying the music of the language and missing its meaning? "Different learning styles may rely on different styles of attention," he says, and might benefit from different methods of instruction.

Like most of neuroscience, questions are more plentiful than answers. We do know some things work better than others, though; Diamond cites the Montessori, Tools of the Mind, and Path curriculums; Jump Math also seems to be making mathematicians of entire classrooms, not just a lucky few, according to John Mighton (who was not on the podcast but did attend the meeting).

The main take-away? Everyone learns a little differently, so relax about it. As Diamond says, "stress impairs executive function."

--Nicky Penttila

Gearing Up for Brain Awareness Week

Brain Awareness Week (BAW) is less than two months away (March 12–18) and here at the Dana Foundation we are excited. Hospitals, universities, schools, senior centers, and other organizations across the world are already buzzing about the brain. Events are being planned in preparation for the big week. Remember, the Dana Foundation and the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives (DABI) are here to help. If you register your organization with DABI and become a BAW partner at www.dana.org/brainweek/, you’ll get access to free BAW materials. Each year hundreds of BAW partners from Texas to Morocco register events with DABI and receive fun and valuable materials and resources for free.

This year the BAW publications and resources are stacked with past favorites like the brain-shaped erasers and pencils, Mindboggling series of booklets, and Dana Alliance Puzzles. The 2012 BAW order form also has some new items. If you are looking for some fun handouts for your event, the Brain Awareness Week buttons and stickers are a great option, as they display the fresh, new design. My laptop is already covered in BAW stickers.  

There are also a number of new additions from the Dana Alliances publications and resources section. The updated Brain Connections pamphlet lists more than 240 organizations in the United States that offer help and guidance in connection with brain-related disorders. The PDF is available online, but a pamphlet-sized physical copy is also available for distribution at BAW events.

We’re introducing three new Staying Sharp booklets in addition to the well-known Successful Aging and Your Brain. First, Late-Life Brain Disorders discusses a few of the most common disorders that affect seniors, including dementia, depression, stroke, Parkinson’s disease, and chronic pain. Learning as We Age describes what recent neuroscience research has uncovered about lifelong learning. The booklet illustrates how continual, active engaging of the brain throughout life can be beneficial to the health of the aging brain. Memory and Aging explains the difference between what’s normal and what’s not in regards to memory loss and aging. The booklet describes the differences between typical age-related changes in memory and the signs of dementia, and gives information on how to maintain brain health.

Brain Awareness Week is right around the corner and now is the time to start planning an event and making use of the free supplies that the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives has to offer. Remember, you must be a BAW partner to take advantage of these great resources, so register today at www.dana.org/brainweek/. And for the social-media fans, follow the action on Twitter (hashtag #brainweek) and on the BAW Facebook page.

--Simon Fischweicher

Growing Concern over Internet Addiction Disorder

I didn’t realize how serious Internet addiction was until I read a recent article on The Huffington Post and learned that people can die from it. I know people who are obsessed with certain websites and Internet games that can take up most of their day. Researchers at the Chinese Academy of Science have gone beyond anecdotes and found brain differences in those with an Internet addiction.

The research was conducted on people under the age of 21, half of whom were identified as having Internet Addiction Disorder (IAD). Researchers said that the part of the brain affected by the Internet is linked to emotional processing, executive thinking skills, and cognitive functioning. The brain changes of those with IAD were similar to what to expect from an alcoholic. According to the article, researchers are deciding if Internet and video game addiction should be classified as a mental disorder.

I’ve seen people who check their Facebook page every few minutes or rush home to play the “Call of Duty” videogame. Sadly, they are over 30 years old. I can understand why researchers would consider it a mental disorder because these people are certainly displaying addictive behavior.

The article mentions two deaths that were at least partly attributed to Internet addiction. In 2007, when IAD’s bid for inclusion in the American Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders was rejected, it was understandable, but today the idea of such a thing seems very real.

--Blayne Jeffries

Dana News Email Blast: January

Below is this week's Dana news email blast. You can sign up to receive this (and other Dana email alerts and/or print publications) by going here.

Social Neuroscience

by John T. Cacioppo, Ph.D. and Stephanie Ortigue, Ph.D.

Social neuroscientists boost our knowledge of the biology of animal and human interactions in areas as diverse as drug abuse, pair-bonding, and social isolation. As the field continues to grow, we will better understand the social, biological, and cognitive factors that determine how we relate to others. From Cerebrum, our online magazine of ideas.

Playing Video Games May Make Specific Changes to the Brain

Areas that are linked to reward and self-control appear to change when young people play video games, according to two recent studies.

Wanted: Better Brain-Process Biomarkers for Drug Trials

Researchers seek faster, cheaper ways to evaluate potential neurodegenerative disease.

Neuromarketing: Prove Thyself & Protect Consumers (Dana Briefing Paper)

Neuromarketing, the practice of using neuroscience to try to determine a person's unconscious biological reactions to a product, is here to stay, but whether it works is much harder to prove.

The Tangles of Neurodegeneration Not Easy to Unravel

Targeting different neurotransmitters hasn't offered a breakthrough, said Ann Young during the recent Society for Neuroscience meeting. Perhaps genetics and attention to the misfolded proteins seen in Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and other diseases can offer a better therapeutic solution.

Delirium: A Preventable Problem

Delirium in the hospital is a common occurrence for the elderly, but there are ways to lower the risk, says Guy McKhann, professor of neurology and neuroscience at Johns Hopkins University.

See also: Brain in the News -- scientifically vetted stories from around the Web, updated weekly

Last Call for Design a Brain Experiment Competition

The Dana Foundation is holding a competition where high school classrooms can compete for a chance to win $500 by designing an original brain-related experiment. Entries are due by January 19, 2012.

Navigating Love and Autism

As they reach adulthood, the overarching quest of many in this first generation to be identified with Asperger syndrome is the same as many of their nonautistic peers: to find someone to love who will love them back. From The New York Times.

 

 

 

Our Two Senses of Smell

It’s lunchtime. You heat up those Chinese takeout leftovers in the microwave and the aroma makes you hungry. Then you take a bite—delicious.

Clearly, you process the smell from the microwave through your nose. But did you know that processing flavor also comes from your sense of smell?

In his new book Neurogastronomy: How the Brain Creates Flavor and Why It Matters, Dana Alliance Member Gordon M. Shepherd explains that we actually have two senses of smell: orthonasal and retronasal.

Orthonasal smell is what happens when we sniff—we breathe in through our noses to sense environmental odors, like the smell from the microwave.

Retronasal smell, on the other hand, is where flavor comes from. Try holding your nose while eating some of those leftovers—you won’t taste much. Breathing out while eating is the doorway to flavor. While we are born recognizing sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and  umami—which are tastes, not flavors, writes Shephard,  “retronasal smells are learned and thus open to individual differences. They account, therefore, for the vast variety of cuisines in the world.”

Bon appetit!

--Johanna Goldberg