depression tagged posts

The Neuropsychiatric Disease-Associated Gene cacna1c Mediates Survival of Young Hippocampal Neurons

A new study shows the death of newborn brain cells may be linked to a genetic risk factor for schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, autism, ADHD, and depression, and at the same time shows a compound currently being developed for use in humans may have therapeutic value for these diseases by preventing the cells from dying.

In 2013, the largest genetic study of psychiatric illness to date implicated mutations in the gene called CACNA1C as a risk factor in 5 major forms of neuropsychiatric disease. All the conditions also share the common clinical feature of high anxiety...

Two neurons of the basolateral amygdala. MIT neuroscientists have found that these neurons play a key role in separating information about positive and negative experiences. Credit: Anna Beyeler and Praneeth Namburi

A new study reveals how 2 populations of neurons contribute to the brain’s inability to correctly assign emotional associations to events, eg those who are depressed often do not feel happy even when experiencing something that they normally enjoy. Learning how this information is routed and misrouted could shed light on mental illnesses including depression, addiction, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder.

In a previous study, Tye’s lab identified 2 populations of neurons involved in processing positive and negative emotions...

What does inflammation in the context of depression look like inside the brain? Emory researchers have found that high inflammation is linked to a “failure to communicate” between two parts of the brain: the ventral striatum (VS, vertical cross section) and the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC, horizontal). Credit: Felger et al, Molecular Psychiatry (2015)

Brain imaging shows distinctive aspects of high-inflammation depression. About 1/3 of people with depression have high levels of inflammation markers in their blood. New research indicates persistent inflammation affects the brain in ways that are connected with stubborn symptoms of depression, such as anhedonia, the inability to experience pleasure.

The findings bolster the case that the high-inflammation form of depression is dist...

Preventive strategies, targeting diet, drugs, body chemistry, mental health, pre-existing disease, and lifestyle may help to stave off dementia. This could be particularly important, given that, as yet, there is no cure, they say. The researchers wanted to look at the factors associated with the development of Alzheimer’s disease in a bid to determine the degree to which these might be modified and so potentially reduce overall risk.

They trawled key research databases, looking for relevant studies published in English from 1968 up to July 2014. Out of almost 17,000 studies, 323, covering 93 different potential risk factors and more than 5000 people, were suitable for inclusion in the analysis...