A team of researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles and NeuroVision Imaging, a Sacramento, California firm, have developed a retinal imaging system that could allow early detection of Alzheimer’s disease. One of the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease is the accumulation of beta-amyloid protein in the brain. There are numerous ways to monitor levels of […]
Tag: Neurology
Scientists Use Light to Erase Unwanted Memories
Researchers at the University of California, Riverside have developed a technique to selectively erase fear memories by weakening connections between the nerve cells involved in forming such memories. Memories can be triggered by stimuli such as sights, sounds, and smells. Some memories are formed during traumatic events, and in this case stimuli associated with the […]
Stimulating the Brain with Magnetic Fields Can Control Movement
Scientists have developed a method to stimulate small clusters of brain cells using magnetic fields. Using this technique, they were able to control movement in mice. Understanding how the brain works is an ongoing effort, with a huge number of research teams working intensively to unlock its secrets. As part of this effort, an international […]
MIT Researchers Detect REM in Sleeping Persons Using Wi-Fi Radio Signals
The Wi-Fi radio waves that our laptops use to communicate with wireless routers are quite sensitive to the environment they pass through. They’re so sensitive that a few years ago researchers at MIT were able to use them to wirelessly detect a child’s movement, breathing, and heart rate. Now the MIT team working with Massachusetts General Hospital […]
Biofeedback System for Parkinson’s Rehab
Researchers at the University of Houston have developed wearable technology to assist Parkinson’s patients to perform rehabilitation exercises in their own home. Parkinson’s symptoms include resting tremors, muscle rigidity, and postural instability. Parkinson’s patients can fall easily, leading to injuries and difficulty performing everyday tasks. One way to address this issue is to have patients […]
Material Developed to Act as Window for Accessing Brain with Ultrasound
Ultrasound energy has the potential to manipulate brain tissues that are difficult to access using direct methods. The problem is that the cranium attenuates the ultrasound signal so much that it becomes practically ineffective. A team of researchers in California and Mexico have developed a special material for ultrasound to pass through that can be placed within […]
Soft Wearable Exosuit Helps Stroke Patients to Walk
Researchers at Harvard and Boston University have developed and tested a soft, wearable exosuit on stroke patients with limited mobility, and found that it can help to promote normal walking. In approximately 80% of stroke patients one limb stops functioning normally. This can cause long-term abnormalities in gait that can reduce a patient’s mobility and increase […]
New Method Visualizes Individual Neural Pathways Using Light
The brain’s functional network is both highly complex and hard to peer into, making it difficult to understand how some neurons are related to others and what their interconnectivity is like. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology in Martinsried, Germany have now developed a way to visualize the electrical activity that single neurons generate […]
Deep Learning Algorithm Diagnoses Schizophrenia from fMRI Scans
A scientific collaboration between researchers at IBM and the University of Alberta in Canada has come up with a software tool that analyzes functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scans of patient brains and with 74% accuracy diagnoses schizophrenia. Moreover, the software’s algorithms were also able to reasonably estimate how bad the symptoms of the disease were […]
Embrace Neonatal MRI System Cleared to Stay Inside Neonatal ICUs
The FDA has just cleared Aspect Imaging‘s Embrace Neonatal MRI System, the first dedicated neonatal MRI system to receive a regulatory green light in the U.S. It’s intended to be used to image the head and brain, and to remain inside of neonatal intensive care units (NICU). Currently, these fragile little patients have to be […]
Stryker’s MultiGen 2RF Generator for Facet Joint Ablations Cleared by FDA
Stryker, a company best known for orthopedic devices, won FDA clearance to introduce its MultiGen 2 RF Generator in the U.S. The device is used to treat pain deriving from facet joints in the spine by delivering radiofrequency energy that ablates targeted tissues. Compared to the previous version of the device, Stryker claims that the MultiGen […]
Stryker’s MultiGen 2RF Generator for Facet Joint Ablations Cleared by FDA
Stryker, a company best known for orthopedic devices, won FDA clearance to introduce its MultiGen 2 RF Generator in the U.S. The device is used to treat pain deriving from facet joints in the spine by delivering radiofrequency energy that ablates targeted tissues. Compared to the previous version of the device, Stryker claims that the MultiGen […]
Non-Invasive gammaCore Device to Fight Pain of Cluster Headaches Released in U.S.
The gammaCore non-invasive vagus nerve stimulator from electroCore, a Basking Ridge, New Jersey company, is now available for adult patients to treat acute pain arising from episodic cluster headaches. Currently only available with a doctor’s prescription, the gammaCore device is used to transmit an electric current through the neck and to the vagus nerve. This is done […]
New Device Makes Possible Simultaneous MRI and EEG Recordings
At the recent International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine Annual Meeting, researchers from Purdue University presented a new technology capable of recording electroencephalography (EEG) signals from the brain while a patient is inside an MRI machine. This may cause a revolution for the study of the brain, as functional MRI (fMRI) and EEG could provide unique […]
Scientists Convince Stem Cells Within Brain to Migrate Toward Injury
To be able to fix the fine structure of damaged neural networks using transplanted stem cells would require a way to guide the stem cells to line up in a desired way. Researchers from University of California, Davis and Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China have discovered that they can use electric current to point to […]
Low Cost Glove Translates Sign Language, May Be Used to Practice Surgery in Virtual Reality
At the University of California San Diego engineers have developed a low-cost electronic glove capable of understanding sign language. A user simply puts it on and can sign away, with the glove wirelessly transmitting what it’s interpreting to another device to be read out or for the words to appear on a screen. The cost […]
Stanford Neurosurgery Department Taking Full Advantage of Virtual Reality
At Stanford Medicine neurosurgeons are relying on virtual reality to better understand the nuances of individual cases and to educate patients on their specific conditions. The system, a product of Surgical Theater, a Colorado company that we covered on a trip to the White House a few years ago, combines data from different imaging modalities to create […]
Million Electrode Array for Brain Interfaces Is Under Development
Researchers at Columbia University are working on substantially improving the abilities of brain-computer interfaces by creating a high density electrode array that can stimulate and read the brain at high precision. The research is part of DARPA’s Neural Engineering System Design (NESD) project that is working on all the different pieces necessary to build a truly […]
Optical Fiber for Movement-Free Activation of Select Neurons in Brain
Researchers from Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia in Lecce, Italy and Harvard Medical School created a probe designed for optogenetic applications. Optogenetics is a recently developed technique that allows scientists to selectively activate neurons within the brain, and this technology may one day be used as a therapeutic tool to treat a variety of neurological conditions. One […]
Closed Loop System Reads Brain Activity to Activate Neurostimulator Only When Needed
At the University of Washington researchers have been focusing on drastically improving the longevity and performance of deep brain stimulators for people suffering from essential tremor. These devices, implanted like pacemakers with electrode leads stretching up into the brain, run on internal batteries. The devices, not knowing when to quiet the symptoms of essential tremor […]