text:
Chapter 17. Learning and Memory
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Research suggests that only 20–30% of drug users actually descend into addiction — defined as the persistent seeking and taking of drugs even in the face of dire personal consequences. Why are some people who use drugs able to do so without turning into addicts, while others continue to abuse, even when the repercussions range from jail time to serious health problems? In a comprehensive review in the European Journal of Neuroscience, Barry Everitt outlines the neural correlates and learning-based processes associated with the transition from drug use, to abuse, to addiction. Drug seeking begins as a goal-directed behavior, with an action (finding and taking drugs) leading to a particular outcome (the drug high). This type of associative learning is mediated by the dorsomedial region of the striatum, the area of the brain that is associated with reward processing, which functions primarily through the neurotransmitter dopamine. In this kind of learning, devaluing the outcome (by decreasing the potency of the drug, for example) tends to decrease the pursuit of the action. When the high is not what it used to be, the motivation to continue seeking it out decreases. However, in long-term abusers, this devalued outcome does not reduce the action — indeed, researchers have found that in cases of chronic drug use, a parallel associative learning process eventually comes to the fore. This process is one of stimulus–response; the conditioned stimuli in this case are the various environmental cues — the sight of the powdery white stuff, the smell of burning aluminum foil — that users associate with getting high and that compel them to seek out drugs. © Association for Psychological Science
Keyword: Drug Abuse; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20506 - Posted: 01.22.2015
It is now one hundred years since drugs were first banned - and all through this long century of waging war on drugs, we have been told a story about addiction, by our teachers, and by our governments. This story is so deeply ingrained in our minds that we take it for granted. It seems obvious. It seems manifestly true. Until I set off three and a half years ago on a 30,000-mile journey for my book 'Chasing The Scream - The First And Last Days of the War on Drugs' to figure out what is really driving the drug war, I believed it too. But what I learned on the road is that almost everything we have been told about addiction is wrong - and there is a very different story waiting for us, if only we are ready to hear it. If we truly absorb this new story, we will have to change a lot more than the drug war. We will have to change ourselves. I learned it from an extraordinary mixture of people I met on my travels. From the surviving friends of Billie Holiday, who helped me to learn how the founder of the war on drugs stalked and helped to kill her. From a Jewish doctor who was smuggled out of the Budapest ghetto as a baby, only to unlock the secrets of addiction as a grown man. From a transsexual crack dealer in Brooklyn who was conceived when his mother, a crack-addict, was raped by his father, an NYPD officer. From a man who was kept at the bottom of a well for two years by a torturing dictatorship, only to emerge to be elected President of Uruguay and to begin the last days of the war on drugs. ©2015 TheHuffingtonPost.com, Inc.
Keyword: Drug Abuse; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20505 - Posted: 01.22.2015
Closing your eyes when trying to recall events increases the chances of accuracy, researchers at the University of Surrey suggest. Scientists tested people's ability to remember details of films showing fake crime scenes. They hope the studies will help witnesses recall details more accurately when questioned by police. They say establishing a rapport with the person asking the questions can also help boost memory. Writing in the journal Legal and Criminological Psychology, scientists tested 178 participants in two separate experiments. In the first, they asked volunteers to watch a film showing an electrician entering a property, carrying out work and then stealing a number of items. Volunteers were then questioned in one of four groups. People were either asked questions with their eyes open or closed, and after a sense of rapport had been built with the interviewer or no attempt had been made to create a friendly introduction. People who had some rapport with their interviewer and had their eyes shut throughout questioning answered three-quarters of the 17 questions correctly. But those who did not have a friendly introduction with the interviewer and had their eyes open answered 41% correctly. The analysis showed that eye closing had the strongest impact on remembering details correctly ,but that feeling comfortable during the interview also helped. In the second experiment, people were asked to remember details of what they had heard during a mock crime scene. © 2015 BBC
Keyword: Learning & Memory; Attention
Link ID: 20493 - Posted: 01.17.2015
By James Gallagher Health editor, BBC News website The key to learning and memory in early life is a lengthy nap, say scientists. Trials with 216 babies up to 12 months old indicated they were unable to remember new tasks if they did not have a lengthy sleep soon afterwards. The University of Sheffield team suggested the best time to learn may be just before sleep and emphasised the importance of reading at bedtime. Experts said sleep may be much more important in early years than at other ages. People spend more of their time asleep as babies than at any other point in their lives. Yet the researchers, in Sheffield and Ruhr University Bochum, in Germany, say "strikingly little is known" about the role of sleep in the first year of life. Learn, sleep, repeat They taught six- to 12-month-olds three new tasks involving playing with hand puppets. Half the babies slept within four hours of learning, while the rest either had no sleep or napped for fewer than 30 minutes. The next day, the babies were encouraged to repeat what they had been taught. The results, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, showed "sleeping like a baby" was vital for learning. On average one-and-a-half tasks could be repeated after having a substantial nap. Yet zero tasks could be repeated if there was little sleep time. Dr Jane Herbert, from the department of psychology at the University of Sheffield, told the BBC News website: "Those who sleep after learning learn well, those not sleeping don't learn at all." © 2015 BBC
Keyword: Sleep; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20472 - Posted: 01.13.2015
by Michael Hotchkiss Forget about it. Your brain is a memory powerhouse, constantly recording experiences in long-term memory. Those memories help you find your way through the world: Who works the counter each morning at your favorite coffee shop? How do you turn on the headlights of your car? What color is your best friend's house? But then your barista leaves for law school, you finally buy a new car and your buddy spends the summer with a paint brush in hand. Suddenly, your memories are out of date. What happens next? An experiment conducted by researchers from Princeton University and the University of Texas-Austin shows that the human brain uses memories to make predictions about what it expects to find in familiar contexts. When those subconscious predictions are shown to be wrong, the related memories are weakened and are more likely to be forgotten. And the greater the error, the more likely you are to forget the memory. "This has the benefit ultimately of reducing or eliminating noisy or inaccurate memories and prioritizing those things that are more reliable and that are more accurate in terms of the current state of the world," said Nicholas Turk-Browne, an associate professor of psychology at Princeton and one of the researchers. The research was featured in an article, "Pruning of memories by context-based prediction error," that appeared in 2014 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The other co-authors are Ghootae Kim, a Princeton graduate student; Jarrod Lewis-Peacock, an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Texas-Austin; and Kenneth Norman, a Princeton professor of psychology and the Princeton Neuroscience Institute. © Medical Xpress 2011-2014,
Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20469 - Posted: 01.10.2015
George Johnson Training a dog to salivate at the sound of a bell would have seemed pretty stupid to Ivan Pavlov. He was after much bigger things. Using instruments like metronomes and harmoniums, he demonstrated that a dog could make astonishingly fine discriminations — distinguishing between a rhythm of 96 and 104 beats a minute or an ascending and a descending musical scale. But what he really wanted to know was what his animals were thinking. His dream was a grand theory of the mind. He couldn't put his subjects on a couch like his colleague Freud and ask them to free-associate, so he gauged their reactions to a variety of stimuli, meticulously counting their "psychic secretions," those droplets of drool. He knew he was pricking at the skin of something deeper. "It would be stupid," he said, "to reject the subjective world." This is not the Pavlov most people think they know. In an excellent new biography, "Ivan Pavlov: A Russian Life in Science," Daniel P. Todes, a medical historian, describes a man whose laboratory in pre-Soviet Russia was like an early-20th-century version of the White House Brain Initiative, with its aim "to revolutionize our understanding of the human mind." That was also Pavlov's goal: to build a science that would "brightly illuminate our mysterious nature" and "our consciousness and its torments." He spoke those words 111 years ago and spent his life pursuing his goal. Yet when we hear his name, we reflexively think of a drooling dog and a clanging bell. Our brains have been conditioned with the myth. © 2014 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20439 - Posted: 12.23.2014
by Helen Thomson HAVE you read this before? A 23-year-old man from the UK almost certainly feels like he has – he's the first person to report persistent déjà vu stemming from anxiety rather than any obvious neurological disorder. Nobody knows exactly how or why déjà vu happens, but for most of us it is rare. Some people experience it more often, as a side effect associated with epileptic seizures or dementia. Now, researchers have discovered the first person with what they call "psychogenic déjà vu" – where the cause appears to be psychological. The man's episodes began just after he started university, a period when he felt anxious and was also experiencing obsessive compulsions. As time went on, his déjà vu became more and more prolonged, and then fairly continuous after he tried LSD. Now, he avoids television and radio, and finds newspapers distressing as the content feels familiar. There are different theories as to what is going on, says Christine Wells at Sheffield Hallam University in the UK, who has written a paper on the man's experiences. "The general theory is that there's a misfiring of neurons in the temporal lobes – which deal with recollection and familiarity. That misfiring during the process of recollection means we interpret a moment in time as something that has already been experienced," she says. Surprisingly, when Wells gave the man a standard recall test, he scored more similarly to people of his own age without the condition than those with epilepsy-related déjà vu. An MRI and an EEG scan of his brain activity also showed no abnormalities. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
Keyword: Emotions; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20427 - Posted: 12.18.2014
By David Noonan It was the day before Christmas, and the normally busy MIT laboratory on Vassar Street in Cambridge was quiet. But creatures were definitely stirring, including a mouse that would soon be world famous. Steve Ramirez, a 24-year-old doctoral student at the time, placed the mouse in a small metal box with a black plastic floor. Instead of curiously sniffing around, though, the animal instantly froze in terror, recalling the experience of receiving a foot shock in that same box. It was a textbook fear response, and if anything, the mouse's posture was more rigid than Ramirez had expected. Its memory of the trauma must have been quite vivid. Which was amazing, because the memory was bogus: The mouse had never received an electric shock in that box. Rather, it was reacting to a false memory that Ramirez and his MIT colleague Xu Liu had planted in its brain. "Merry Freaking Christmas," read the subject line of the email Ramirez shot off to Liu, who was spending the 2012 holiday in Yosemite National Park. The observation culminated more than two years of a long-shot research effort and supported an extraordinary hypothesis: Not only was it possible to identify brain cells involved in the encoding of a single memory, but those specific cells could be manipulated to create a whole new "memory" of an event that never happened. "It's a fantastic feat," says Howard Eichenbaum, a leading memory researcher and director of the Center for Neuroscience at Boston University, where Ramirez did his undergraduate work. "It's a real breakthrough that shows the power of these techniques to address fundamental questions about how the brain works." In a neuroscience breakthrough, the duo implanted a false memory in a mouse
Keyword: Learning & Memory; Emotions
Link ID: 20418 - Posted: 12.16.2014
By Gary Stix Our site recently ran a great story about how brain training really doesn't endow you instantly with genius IQ. The games you play just make you better at playing those same games. They aren't a direct route to a Mensa membership. Just a few days before that story came out—Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences—published a report that suggested that playing action video games, Call of Duty: Black Ops II and the like—actually lets gamers learn the essentials of a particular visual task (the orientation of a Gabor signal—don't ask) more rapidly than non-gamers, a skill that has real-world relevance beyond the confines of the artificial reality of the game itself. As psychologists say, it has "transfer effects." Gamers appear to have learned how to do stuff like home in quickly on a target or multitask better than those who inhabit the non-gaming world. Their skills might, in theory, make them great pilots or laparoscopic surgeons, not just high scorers among their peers. Action video games are not billed as brain training, but both Call of Duty and nominally accredited training programs like Lumosity are both structured as computer games. So that leads to the question of what's going on here? Every new finding about brain training as B.S. appears to be contradicted by another that points to the promise of cognitive exercise, if that's what you call a session with Call of Duty. It may boil down to a realization that the whole story about exercising your neurons to keep the brain supple may be a lot less simple than proponents make it out to be. © 2014 Scientific American
Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20409 - Posted: 12.13.2014
by Helen Thomson Zapping your brain might make you better at maths tests – or worse. It depends how anxious you are about taking the test in the first place. A recent surge of studies has shown that brain stimulation can make people more creative and better at maths, and can even improve memory, but these studies tend to neglect individual differences. Now, Roi Cohen Kadosh at the University of Oxford and his colleagues have shown that brain stimulation can have completely opposite effects depending on your personality. Previous research has shown that a type of non-invasive brain stimulation called transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) – which enhances brain activity using an electric current – can improve mathematical ability when applied to the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, an area involved in regulating emotion. To test whether personality traits might affect this result, Kadosh's team tried the technique on 25 people who find mental arithmetic highly stressful, and 20 people who do not. They found that participants with high maths anxiety made correct responses more quickly and, after the test, showed lower levels of cortisol, an indicator of stress. On the other hand, individuals with low maths anxiety performed worse after tDCS. "It is hard to believe that all people would benefit similarly [from] brain stimulation," says Cohen Kadosh. He says that further research could shed light on how to optimise the technology and help to discover who is most likely to benefit from stimulation. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
Keyword: Brain imaging; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20406 - Posted: 12.10.2014
Ian Sample, science editor Electrical brain stimulation equipment – which can boost cognitive performance and is easy to buy online – can have bad effects, impairing brain functioning, research from scientists at Oxford University has shown. A steady stream of reports of stimulators being able to boost brain performance, coupled with the simplicity of the devices, has led to a rise in DIY enthusiasts who cobble the equipment together themselves, or buy it assembled on the web, then zap themselves at home. In science laboratories brain stimulators have long been used to explore cognition. The equipment uses electrodes to pass gentle electric pulses through the brain, to stimulate activity in specific regions of the organ. Roi Cohen Kadosh, who led the study, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, said: "It's not something people should be doing at home at this stage. I do not recommend people buy this equipment. At the moment it's not therapy, it's an experimental tool." The Oxford scientists used a technique called transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) to stimulate the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex in students as they did simple sums. The results of the test were surprising. Students who became anxious when confronted with sums became calmer and solved the problems faster than when they had sham stimulation (the stimulation itself lasted only 30 seconds of the half hour study). The shock was that the students who did not fear maths performed worse with the same stimulation.
Keyword: Brain imaging; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20405 - Posted: 12.10.2014
|By Bret Stetka When University of Bonn psychologist Monika Eckstein designed her latest published study, the goal was simple: administer a hormone into the noses of 62 men in hopes that their fear would go away. And for the most part, it did. The hormone was oxytocin, often called our "love hormone" due to its crucial role in mother-child relationships, social bonding, and intimacy (levels soar during sex). But it also seems to have a significant antianxiety effect. Give oxytocin to people with certain anxiety disorders, and activity in the amygdala—the primary fear center in human and other mammalian brains, two almond-shaped bits of brain tissue sitting deep beneath our temples—falls. The amygdala normally buzzes with activity in response to potentially threatening stimuli. When an organism repeatedly encounters a stimulus that at first seemed frightening but turns out to be benign—like, say, a balloon popping—a brain region called the prefrontal cortex inhibits amygdala activity. But in cases of repeated presentations of an actual threat, or in people with anxiety who continually perceive a stimulus as threatening, amygdala activity doesn't subside and fear memories are more easily formed. To study the effects of oxytocin on the development of these fear memories, Eckstein and her colleagues first subjected study participants to Pavlovian fear conditioning, in which neutral stimuli (photographs of faces and houses) were sometimes paired with electric shocks. Subjects were then randomly assigned to receive either a single intranasal dose of oxytocin or a placebo. Thirty minutes later they received functional MRI scans while undergoing simultaneous fear extinction therapy, a standard approach to anxiety disorders in which patients are continually exposed to an anxiety-producing stimulus until they no longer find it stressful. In this case they were again exposed to images of faces and houses, but this time minus the electric shocks. © 2014 Scientific American
Keyword: Learning & Memory; Emotions
Link ID: 20397 - Posted: 12.06.2014
By recording from the brains of bats as they flew and landed, scientists have found that the animals have a "neural compass" - allowing them to keep track of exactly where and even which way up they are. These head-direction cells track bats in three dimensions as they manoeuvre. The researchers think a similar 3D internal navigation system is likely to be found throughout the animal kingdom. The findings are published in the journal Nature. Lead researcher Arseny Finkelstein, from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, explained that this was the first time measurements had been taken from animals as they had flown around a space in any direction and even carried out their acrobatic upside-down landings. "We're the only lab currently able to conduct wireless recordings in flying animals," he told BBC News. "A tiny device attached to the bats allows us to monitor the activity of single neurons while the animal is freely moving." Decades of study of the brain's internal navigation system garnered three renowned neuroscientists this year's Nobel Prize for physiology and medicine. The research, primarily in rats, revealed how animals had "place" and "grid" cells - essentially building a map in the brain and coding for where on that map an animal was at any time. Mr Finkelstein and his colleagues' work in bats has revealed that their brains also have "pitch" and "roll" cells. These tell the animal whether it is pointing upwards or downwards and whether its head is tilted one way or the other. BBC © 2014
Keyword: Hearing; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20393 - Posted: 12.04.2014
By CHRISTOPHER F. CHABRIS and DANIEL J. SIMONS NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON, the astrophysicist and host of the TV series "Cosmos," regularly speaks to audiences on topics ranging from cosmology to climate change to the appalling state of science literacy in America. One of his staple stories hinges on a line from President George W. Bush's speech to Congress after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. In a 2008 talk, for example, Dr. Tyson said that in order "to distinguish we from they" — meaning to divide Judeo-Christian Americans from fundamentalist Muslims — Mr. Bush uttered the words "Our God is the God who named the stars." Dr. Tyson implied that President Bush was prejudiced against Islam in order to make a broader point about scientific awareness: Two-thirds of the named stars actually have Arabic names, given to them at a time when Muslims led the world in astronomy — and Mr. Bush might not have said what he did if he had known this fact. This is a powerful example of how our biases can blind us. But not in the way Dr. Tyson thought. Mr. Bush wasn't blinded by religious bigotry. Instead, Dr. Tyson was fooled by his faith in the accuracy of his own memory. In his post-9/11 speech, Mr. Bush actually said, "The enemy of America is not our many Muslim friends," and he said nothing about the stars. Mr. Bush had indeed once said something like what Dr. Tyson remembered; in 2003 Mr. Bush said, in tribute to the astronauts lost in the Columbia space shuttle explosion, that "the same creator who names the stars also knows the names of the seven souls we mourn today." Critics pointed these facts out; some accused Dr. Tyson of lying and argued that the episode should call into question his reliability as a scientist and a public advocate. © 2014 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20387 - Posted: 12.03.2014
|By David Z. Hambrick If you've spent more than about 5 minutes surfing the web, listening to the radio, or watching TV in the past few years, you will know that cognitive training—better known as "brain training"—is one of the hottest new trends in self improvement. Lumosity, which offers web-based tasks designed to improve cognitive abilities such as memory and attention, boasts 50 million subscribers and advertises on National Public Radio. Cogmed claims to be "a computer-based solution for attention problems caused by poor working memory," and BrainHQ will help you "make the most of your unique brain." The promise of all of these products, implied or explicit, is that brain training can make you smarter—and make your life better. Yet, according to a statement released by the Stanford University Center on Longevity and the Berlin Max Planck Institute for Human Development, there is no solid scientific evidence to back up this promise. Signed by 70 of the world's leading cognitive psychologists and neuroscientists, the statement minces no words: "The strong consensus of this group is that the scientific literature does not support claims that the use of software-based "brain games" alters neural functioning in ways that improve general cognitive performance in everyday life, or prevent cognitive slowing and brain disease." The statement also cautions that although some brain training companies "present lists of credentialed scientific consultants and keep registries of scientific studies pertinent to cognitive training…the cited research is [often] only tangentially related to the scientific claims of the company, and to the games they sell." © 2014 Scientific American,
Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20380 - Posted: 12.02.2014
By Nicholas Bakalar Researchers have found that people diagnosed with diabetes in their 50's are significantly more likely than others to suffer mental decline by their 70's. The study, published Monday in the Annals of Internal Medicine, started in 1990. Scientists examined 13,351 black and white adults, aged 48 to 67, for diabetes and prediabetes using self-reported physician diagnoses and glucose control tests. They also administered widely used tests of memory, reasoning, problem solving and planning. About 13 percent had diabetes at the start. The researchers followed them with five periodic examinations over the following 20 years. By that time, 5,987 participants were still enrolled. After adjusting for numerous health and behavioral factors, and for the large attrition in the study, the researchers found people with diabetes suffered a 30 percent larger decline in mental acuity than those without the disease. Diabetes can impair blood circulation, and the authors suggest that the association of diabetes with thinking and memory problems may be the result of damage to small blood vessels in the brain. "People may think cognitive decline with age is inevitable, but it's not," said the senior author, Elizabeth Selvin, an associate professor of epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. "Factors like diabetes are potentially modifiable. If we can better control diabetes we can stave off cognitive decline and future dementia." © 2014 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Obesity; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20377 - Posted: 12.02.2014
by Andy Coghlan What would Stewart Little make of it? Mice have been created whose brains are half human. As a result, the animals are smarter than their siblings. The idea is not to mimic fiction, but to advance our understanding of human brain diseases by studying them in whole mouse brains rather than in dishes. The altered mice still have mouse neurons – the "thinking" cells that make up around half of all their brain cells. But practically all the glial cells in their brains, the ones that support the neurons, are human. "It's still a mouse brain, not a human brain," says Steve Goldman of the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York. "But all the non-neuronal cells are human." Goldman's team extracted immature glial cells from donated human fetuses. They injected them into mouse pups where they developed into astrocytes, a star-shaped type of glial cell. Within a year, the mouse glial cells had been completely usurped by the human interlopers. The 300,000 human cells each mouse received multiplied until they numbered 12 million, displacing the native cells. "We could see the human cells taking over the whole space," says Goldman. "It seemed like the mouse counterparts were fleeing to the margins." Astrocytes are vital for conscious thought, because they help to strengthen the connections between neurons, called synapses. Their tendrils (see image) are involved in coordinating the transmission of electrical signals across synapses. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
Keyword: Learning & Memory; Glia
Link ID: 20375 - Posted: 12.01.2014
By BENEDICT CAREY Quick: Which American president served before slavery ended, John Tyler or Rutherford B. Hayes? If you need Google to get the answer, you are not alone. (It is Tyler.) Collective cultural memory — for presidents, for example — works according to the same laws as the individual kind, at least when it comes to recalling historical names and remembering them in a given order, researchers reported on Thursday. The findings suggest that leaders who are well known today, like the elder President George Bush and President Bill Clinton, will be all but lost to public memory in just a few decades. The particulars from the new study, which tested Americans' ability to recollect the names of past presidents, are hardly jaw-dropping: People tend to recall best the presidents who served recently, as well as the first few in the country's history. They also remember those who navigated historic events, like the ending of slavery (Abraham Lincoln) and World War II (Franklin D. Roosevelt). But the broader significance of the report — the first to measure forgetfulness over a 40-year period, using a constant list — is that societies collectively forget according to the same formula as, say, a student who has studied a list of words. Culture imitates biology, even though the two systems work in vastly different ways. The new paper was published in the journal Science. "It's an exciting study, because it mixes history and psychology and finds this one-on-one correspondence" in the way memory functions, said David C. Rubin, a psychologist at Duke University who was not involved in the research. The report is based on four surveys by psychologists now at Washington University in St. Louis, conducted from 1974 to 2014. In the first three, in 1974, 1991 and 2009, Henry L. Roediger III gave college students five minutes to write down as many presidents as they could remember, in order. © 2014 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20364 - Posted: 11.29.2014
By Linda Searing THE QUESTION Keeping your brain active by working is widely believed to protect memory and thinking skills as we age. Does the type of work matter? THIS STUDY involved 1,066 people who, at an average age of 70, took a battery of tests to measure memory, processing speed and cognitive ability. The jobs they had held were rated by the complexity of dealings with people, data and things. Those whose main jobs required complex work, especially in dealings with people — such as social workers, teachers, managers, graphic designers and musicians — had higher cognitive scores than those who had held jobs requiring less-complex dealings, such as construction workers, food servers and painters. Overall, more-complex occupations were tied to higher cognitive scores, regardless of someone's IQ, education or environment. WHO MAY BE AFFECTED? Older adults. Cognitive abilities change with age, so it can take longer to recall information or remember where you placed your keys. That is normal and not the same thing as dementia, which involves severe memory loss as well as declining ability to function day to day. Commonly suggested ways to maintain memory and thinking skills include staying socially active, eating healthfully and getting adequate sleep as well as such things as doing crossword puzzles, learning to play a musical instrument and taking varied routes to common destinations when driving.
Keyword: Learning & Memory
Link ID: 20359 - Posted: 11.26.2014
By Gary Stix One area of brain science that has drawn intense interest in recent years is the study of what psychologists call reconsolidation—a ponderous technical term that, once translated, means giving yourself a second chance. Memories of our daily experience are formed, often during sleep, by inscribing—or "consolidating"—a record of what happened into neural tissue. Joy at the birth of a child or terror in response to a violent personal assault. A bad memory, once fixed, may replay again and again, turning toxic and all-consuming. For the traumatized, the desire to forget becomes an impossible dream. Reconsolidation allows for a do-over by drawing attention to the emotional and factual content of traumatic experience. In the safety of a therapist's office, the patient lets demons return and then the goal is to reshape karma to form a new more benign memory. The details remain the same, but the power of the old terror to overwhelm and induce psychic paralysis begins to subside. The clinician would say that the memory has undergone a change in "valence"—from negative to neutral and detached. The trick to undertaking successful reconsolidation requires revival of these memories without provoking panic and chaos that can only makes things worse. Talk therapies and psycho-pharm may not be enough. One new idea just starting to be explored is the toning down of memories while a patient is fast asleep © 2014 Scientific American,
Keyword: Learning & Memory; Emotions
Link ID: 20357 - Posted: 11.25.2014


text:
The New York Wheel will have a host of luxury amenities including mobile bars and a 20-seat eatery.
After a long delayed vote, the council unanimously approved the Ferris wheel and outlet mall.
The commission unanimously approved the 625-foot-tall Ferris wheel, which is set to open in 2016.
Community Board 1's Land Use Committee voted in favor of the wheel and outlet malls' application.
At a civic association meeting, residents expressed concern that the wheel will back up traffic.
At the first public meeting for the New York Wheel, residents complained about the loss of their view.
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Medieval Knight
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All Knight Adult Womens Costume
Slay the crowd in this All Knight adult womens costume. The black and silver mini dress of this sexy womens costume features a tiered, crenulated hem skirt. Matching arm cuffs and boot covers complete this womens medieval costume.
Medieval Sword with Gold Grip
Ideal for any swashbuckling costume from Pirate to knight, Prince or thief, this handsome weapon with Gothic detail is the one to beat!
Black Medieval Mask
Take over the night on Halloween when you wear this Black Medieval Mask. This disguise feature black glitter design around the eyes.
Warrior's Axe
From the battlefield to the graveyard, this elegantly detailed skull between blades and bones handle. This is an ideal weapon addition to countless costumes like a Gladiator or a Dark Gothic Knight.


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Apr 19
Kata Miletich
Sounds Like: Manu Chao, Ojos de Brujo, Macaco, Zap Mama, Ozomatli
Label: None
Manager: None
Bio: CALIFAS MESTIZO MUSIC: Direct from San Francisco's fertile music scene, LoCura taps into the diverse sounds that have a rich history in the Bay Area, weaving them together in an uncanny way to reveal their common roots. Mixing Flamenco with Reggae and Cumbia with Ska through contagious rhythms a...See Full Bio
Added a new video: ""Cumbia Mama" LoCura at Sweet Pea Festival Bozeman 2014" http://www.reverbnation.com/q/5p1phq #video


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Helen Mirren: 'I'm not chopped liver'
- Film
- September 5, 2014, 01:00
'I never read my own interviews," Helen Mirren proclaims with a slight shudder. She pulls herself up. "Oh, I shouldn't say that to you. Should I? S(...)
Parkinson criticises BBC handling of Cliff Richard search
- August 18, 2014, 01:00
Former BBC journalist Sir Michael Parkinson has described the corporation's handling of the police investigation into singer Sir Cliff Richard as an "(...)
Sean Hughes: Why am I in the garden with a kettle in my hand?
- Life & Style
- August 5, 2014, 01:00
Often on stage I get introduced as a veteran comic, after which I go on to explain that I'm only 48 and have never actually fought in any war. I al(...)
Olympic swimming star Ian Thorpe comes out as gay
- Other Sports
- July 13, 2014, 10:11
Australian swimmer Ian Thorpe, whose five-medal performance at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney captivated his country, has revealed in an Australian tele(...)
The princess and the frog
- Film
- March 28, 2014
Well, this is strange. One gets to meet all sorts in the interviewing lark: faded, fetid heartthrobs; just-about-living legends; distinguished avat(...)
Chat show host Parkinson admits he has cancer
- July 7, 2013, 11:46
Chat show host Sir Michael Parkinson has revealed he has cancer.The television presenter (78) is currently undergoing radiotherapy for prostate cance(...)


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Jake, the son of Shane Ritchie and Coleen Nolan, ended up with a face full of slap courtesy of his girlfriend
The 23-year-old was surely making the most of the Sunshine State with her choice of clothing
Little Mix star Jesy Nelson does the strangest Jamaican accent we've ever heard in hilarious viral clip - Just Sayin'
The 23-year-old enjoyed the play Ghost Stories in London with Jake, who is the son of EastEnders' Shane Richie and Loose Women star Coleen Nolan
The girls put on one of their sexiest performances at the music festival, and we don't think we've seen them all in so little before
The singers were coincidentally seeing lads from dance group Diversity but have ended the romance over conflicting schedules
The band first gave us a snippet of an idea they were going a whole lot sexier with their new Salute video, but we never expected THIS
The girl group led Kelly Brook's bar in a party line after earlier performing ahead of a rugby union clash at Twickenham
The girls have got the charity hit this year with single Word Up and they journeyed to see some of the families they're helping
The Little Mix ladies took some time out of their busy US tour schedule to soak up the sun on the beach
The Little Mix lady debuted the new ink as the band release a sneak peek of their Sport Relief single video
The girl band star flashes her new arm inking stretching from her wrist to her elbow - haven't we seen one a bit like this before?
The singer has reportedly dropped from a size 12 to a size 6
The girlband on fame, fashion, success and ambitions for some zig-a-zig-ah
They may have smashed the record set by the Spice Girls and flown into the US Billboard chart but their Stateside devotees need help with their name
The singer Tweeted an intimate snap of them together in bed (she's not naked though, calm down), and reveals Jordan pet name
For the first time Perrie opens up and admits she wouldn't have got through the past three months without the support of her bandmates, and says Zayn is her 'best friend'
Dozy security guards mistook Jesy's bejewelled bag for a weapon while Perrie kept setting off the metal detector alarm.
Jesy is showing off her new slim figure in the same Batman dress that Cheryl Cole wore last week
Perrie Edwards, Jesy Nelson, Leigh-Anne Pinnock and Jade Thirlwall ready to follow in the footsteps of One Direction and conquer the world
I caught up with the gang at their publicists' offices in London's Soho as the girls excitedly described their latest spin-off
They released the video for catchy new single Wings today and finally the four girls have ended X Factor voodoo - watch here
Johnny Nelson, who had racked up huge debts with a £100-a-day cocaine habit, walked free from court with a 10-month suspended sentence
The girls partied in London, and looked as lovely as ever. No drunk pictures in sight *unlike 3am's night out last night*
Now the singing competition's over are they all competing for the title of 'Most 'Interestingly' Dressed'?
She may have been axed from the US X Factor after one episode, but that hasn't stopped Cheryl Cole from winning a telly award for her work on the show.
X Factor winner and Little Mix singer Leigh-Anne has admitted to making one royally embarrassing gaff, revealing she called Prince Harry, 'Barry'.
Little Mix beauty Jesy Nelson has been bullied into a strenuous exercise regime by the cruel taunts of vicious online trolls.
The brother of Little Mix star Jesy Nelson appeared in court yesterday charged with dealing cocaine.
This is an actual 'don't you know who I am' and a 'your name's not down you're not coming in' moment, right here, in the purest pictorial form, for all the world to see.


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Chapter 11. Motor Control and Plasticity
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Carl Zimmer Scientists in Iceland have produced an unprecedented snapshot of a nation's genetic makeup, discovering a host of previously unknown gene mutations that may play roles in ailments as diverse as Alzheimer's disease, heart disease and gallstones. "This is amazing work, there's no question about it," said Daniel G. MacArthur, a geneticist at Massachusetts General Hospital who was not involved in the research. "They've now managed to get more genetic data on a much larger chunk of the population than in any other country in the world." In a series of papers published on Wednesday in the journal Nature Genetics, researchers at Decode, an Icelandic genetics firm owned by Amgen, described sequencing the genomes — the complete DNA — of 2,636 Icelanders, the largest collection ever analyzed in a single human population. With this trove of genetic information, the scientists were able to accurately infer the genomes of more than 100,000 other Icelanders, or almost a third of the entire country. "From the technical point of view, these papers are a tour-de-force," said David Reich, a geneticist at Harvard Medical School who was not involved in the research. While some diseases, like cystic fibrosis, are caused by a single genetic mutation, the most common ones are not. Instead, mutations to a number of different genes can each raise the risk of getting, say, heart disease or breast cancer. Discovering these mutations can shed light on these diseases and point to potential treatments. But many of them are rare, making it necessary to search large groups of people to find them. The wealth of data created in Iceland may enable scientists to begin doing that. In their new study, the researchers at Decode present several such revealing mutations. For example, they found eight people in Iceland who shared a mutation on a gene called MYL4. Medical records showed that they also have early onset atrial fibrillation, a type of irregular heartbeat. © 2015 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Genes & Behavior; Alzheimers
Link ID: 20724 - Posted: 03.26.2015
By Kate Baggaley Mutations on a gene necessary for keeping cells clean can cause Lou Gehrig's disease, scientists report online March 24 in Nature Neuroscience. The gene is one of many that have been connected to the condition. In amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, nerve cells that control voluntary movement die, leading to paralysis. Scientists have previously identified mutations in 29 genes that are linked with ALS, but these genes account for less than one-third of all cases. To track down more genes, a team of European researchers looked at the protein-coding DNA of 252 ALS patients with a family history of the disease, as well as of 827 healthy people. The team discovered eight mutations on a gene called TBK1 that were associated with ALS. TBK1 normally codes for a protein that controls inflammation and cleans out damaged proteins from cells. "We do not know which of these two principle functions of TBK1 is the more relevant one" to ALS, says coauthor Jochen Weishaupt, a neurologist at Ulm University in Germany. In cells with one of the eight TBK1 mutations, the protein either is missing or lacks components that it needs to interact with other proteins, the researchers found. TBK1 mutations may explain 2 percent of ALS cases that run in families, which make up about 10 percent of all incidences of the disease, Weishaupt says. © Society for Science & the Public 2000 - 2015
Keyword: ALS-Lou Gehrig's Disease
; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 20716 - Posted: 03.25.2015
By Gary Stix One of the most intriguing new areas of research in neuroscience has to do with the discovery that proteins involved with Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and other neurodegenerative illnesses can contort into the wrong shape. The misshapen molecules can spread throughout the brain in a manner akin to prion diseases—the most notorious of which is variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, better known as Mad Cow. Misfolded proteins can lead to a buildup of cellular gunk that then causes damage inside or outside cells. If the process of misfolding observed in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's is similar to the one in Mad Cow, the next question is whether these misshapen proteins are transmissible from one organism to another. Last month, an article appeared in Acta Neuropathologica Communications from researchers at the Centre for Biological Threats and Special Pathogens at the Robert Koch-Institut in Berlin that raised questions about whether medical instruments need to be decontaminated if they come into contact with post-mortem brain tissue from Alzheimer's or Parkinson's patients. The case for putting in place such prophylaxis is rooted in lab studies that show that injecting deposits of these proteins into an animal brain can initiate a "seeding" process in which one protein causes another to misfold. "Whether those harmful effects can be also caused by transmitted protein particles in humans who express mutated or normal alpha-synuclein, A-beta or tau is still unknown," the article says. But then it goes on: "…the ability to decontaminate medical instruments from aggregated A-beta, tau and alpha-synuclein may potentially add to patient safety." © 2015 Scientific American
Keyword: Prions; Alzheimers
Link ID: 20714 - Posted: 03.24.2015
Jane Brody The Holy Grail in any progressive disease is to find it early enough to start effective treatment before irreversible damage has occurred. For Parkinson's disease, which afflicts 1.5 million Americans and growing, a new study has brought this goal a little closer. The study, conducted among more than 54,000 British men and women, identified a slew of symptoms that were more likely to be present in people who years later were diagnosed with Parkinson's. The findings underscore the prevailing view among neurologists that the damage caused by this disease begins long before classic symptoms like tremors, rigidity and an unsteady gait develop and a definite diagnosis can be made. The study, by Dr. Anette Schrag and fellow neurologists at the University College London, was published in The Lancet in January. As many as five years before a diagnosis of Parkinson's, those who developed it were more likely to have experienced tremor, balance problems, constipation, low blood pressure, dizziness, erectile and urinary dysfunction, fatigue, depression and anxiety. In addition, Dr. Claire Henchcliffe, director of the Parkinson's Disease and Movement Disorders Institute at Weill Cornell Medical Center, said that REM sleep behavior disorder, characterized by a tendency to act out one's dreams while asleep, is one of the strongest prediagnostic symptoms, along with a lost sense of smell and subtle changes in cognition. Dr. Melissa J. Nirenberg, a Parkinson's disease specialist at New York University Medical Center, said, "Up to 80 percent of people with the sleep disorder get Parkinson's or a similar neurodegenerative disease." © 2015 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Parkinsons; Sleep
Link ID: 20698 - Posted: 03.19.2015
Jon Hamilton Since his birth 33 years ago, Jonathan Keleher has been living without a cerebellum, a structure that usually contains about half the brain's neurons. This exceedingly rare condition has left Jonathan with a distinctive way of speaking and a walk that is slightly awkward. He also lacks the balance to ride a bicycle. But all that hasn't kept him from living on his own, holding down an office job and charming pretty much every person he meets. "I've always been more into people than anything else," Jonathan tells me when I meet him at his parents' house in Concord, Mass., a suburb of Boston. "Why read a book or why do anything when you can be social and talk to people?" Jonathan is also making an important contribution to neuroscience. By allowing scientists to study him and his brain, he is helping to change some long-held misconceptions about what the cerebellum does. And that, in turn, could help the hundreds of thousands of people whose cerebellums have been damaged by a stroke, infection or disease. For decades, the cerebellum has been the "Rodney Dangerfield of the brain," says Dr. Jeremy Schmahmann, a professor of neurology at Harvard and Massachusetts General Hospital. It gets no respect because most scientists only know about its role in balance and fine motor control. © 2015 NPR
Keyword: Emotions; Attention
Link ID: 20697 - Posted: 03.17.2015
Jon Hamilton A new understanding of the brain's cerebellum could lead to new treatments for people with problems caused by some strokes, autism and even schizophrenia. That's because there's growing evidence that symptoms ranging from difficulty with abstract thinking to emotional instability to psychosis all have links to the cerebellum, says Jeremy Schmahmann, a professor of neurology at Harvard and Massachusetts General Hospital. "The cerebellum has all these functions we were previously unaware of," Schmahmann says. Scientists once thought the cerebellum's role was limited to balance and coordinating physical movements. In the past couple of decades, though, there has been growing evidence that it also plays a role in thinking and emotions. As described in an earlier post, some of the most compelling evidence has come from people like Jonathan Keleher, people born without a cerebellum. "I'm good at routine (activities) and (meeting) people," says Keleher, who is 33. He also has good long-term memory. What he's not good at is strategizing and abstract thinking. But remarkably, Keleher's abilities in these areas have improved dramatically over time. "I'm always working on how to better myself," he says. "And it's a continuous struggle." © 2015 NPR
Keyword: Autism; Schizophrenia
Link ID: 20696 - Posted: 03.17.2015
Jon Hamilton Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis ravage the brain in very different ways. But they have at least one thing in common, says Corinne Lasmezas, a neuroscientist and professor at Scripps Research Institute, in Jupiter, Fla. Each spreads from brain cell to brain cell like an infection. "So if we could block this [process], that might prevent the diseases," Lasmezas says. It's an idea that's being embraced by a growing number of researchers these days, including Nobel laureate Dr. Stanley Prusiner, who first recognized in the 1980s the infectious nature of brain proteins that came to be called prions. But the idea that mad cow prions could cause disease in people has its origins in an epidemic of mad cow disease that occurred in Europe and the U.K. some 15 years ago. Back then, Lasmezas was a young researcher in France studying how mad cow, formally known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, was transmitted. "At that time, nobody knew if this new disease in cows was actually transmissible to humans," she says. In 1996, Lasmezas published a study strongly suggesting that it was. "So that was my first great research discovery," she says. Prions, it turns out, become toxic to brain cells when folded into an abnormal shape. "This misfolded protein basically kills the neurons," Lasmezas says. © 2015 NPR
Keyword: Prions; Parkinsons
Link ID: 20675 - Posted: 03.10.2015
by Sarah Zielinski Before they grow wings and fly, young praying mantises have to rely on leaps to move around. But these little mantises are really good at jumping. Unlike most insects, which tend to spin uncontrollably and sometimes crash land, juvenile praying mantises make precision leaps with perfect landings. But how do they do that? To find out, Malcolm Burrows of the University of Cambridge in England and colleagues filmed 58 juvenile Stagmomantis theophila praying mantises making 381 targeted jumps. The results of their study appear March 5 in Current Biology. For each test leap, the researchers put a young insect on a ledge with a black rod placed one to two body lengths away. A jump to the rod was fast — only 80 milliseconds, faster than a blink of an eye — but high-speed video captured every move at 1,000 frames per second. That let the scientists see what was happening: First, the insect shook its head from side to side, scanning its path. Then it rocked backwards and curled up its abdomen, readying itself to take a leap. With a push of its legs, the mantis was off. In the air, it rotated its abdomen, hind legs and front legs, but its body stayed level until it hit the target and landed on all four limbs. "The abdomen, front legs and hind legs performed a series of clockwise and anticlockwise rotations during which they exchanged angular momentum at different times and in different combinations," the researchers write. "The net result … was that the trunk of the mantis spun by 50˚relative to the horizontal with a near-constant angular momentum, aligning itself perfectly for landing with the front and hind legs ready to grasp the target." © Society for Science & the Public 2000 - 2015
Keyword: Vision
Link ID: 20663 - Posted: 03.07.2015
By Abby Phillip Jan Scheuermann, who has quadriplegia, brings a chocolate bar to her mouth using a robot arm guided by her thoughts. Research assistant Elke Brown watches in the background. (University of Pittsburgh Medical Center) Over at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, also known as DARPA, there are some pretty amazing (and often top-secret) things going on. But one notable component of a DARPA project was revealed by a Defense Department official at a recent forum, and it is the stuff of science fiction movies. According to DARPA Director Arati Prabhakar, a paralyzed woman was successfully able use her thoughts to control an F-35 and a single-engine Cessna in a flight simulator. It's just the latest advance for one woman, 55-year-old Jan Scheuermann, who has been the subject of two years of groundbreaking neurosignaling research. First, Scheuermann began by controlling a robotic arm and accomplishing tasks such as feeding herself a bar of chocolate and giving high fives and thumbs ups. Then, researchers learned that -- surprisingly -- Scheuermann was able to control both right-hand and left-hand prosthetic arms with just the left motor cortex, which is typically responsible for controlling the right-hand side. After that, Scheuermann decided she was up for a new challenge, according to Prabhakar.
Keyword: Robotics
Link ID: 20647 - Posted: 03.04.2015
by Hal Hodson Video: Bionic arm trumps flesh after elective amputation Bionic hands are go. Three men with serious nerve damage had their hands amputated and replaced by prosthetic ones that they can control with their minds. The procedure, dubbed "bionic reconstruction", was carried out by Oskar Aszmann at the Medical University of Vienna, Austria. The men had all suffered accidents which damaged the brachial plexus – the bundle of nerve fibres that runs from the spine to the hand. Despite attempted repairs to those nerves, the arm and hand remained paralysed. "But still there are some nerve fibres present," says Aszmann. "The injury is so massive that there are only a few. This is just not enough to make the hand alive. They will never drive a hand, but they might drive a prosthetic hand." This approach works because the prosthetic hands come with their own power source. Aszmann's patients plug their hands in to charge every night. Relying on electricity from the grid to power the hand means all the muscles and nerves need do is send the right signals to a prosthetic. Before the operation, Aszmann's patients had to prepare their bodies and brains. First he transplanted leg muscle into their arms to boost the signal from the remaining nerve fibres. Three months later, after the nerves had grown into the new muscle, the men started training their brains. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
Keyword: Robotics
Link ID: 20617 - Posted: 02.26.2015
By Michelle Roberts Health editor, BBC News online Scientists have proposed a new idea for detecting brain conditions including Alzheimer's - a skin test. Their work, which is at an early stage, found the same abnormal proteins that accumulate in the brain in such disorders can also be found in skin. Early diagnosis is key to preventing the loss of brain tissue in dementia, which can go undetected for years. But experts said even more advanced tests, including ones of spinal fluid, were still not ready for clinic. If they were, then doctors could treatment at the earliest stages, before irreversible brain damage or mental decline has taken place. Brain biomarker Investigators have been hunting for suitable biomarkers in the body - molecules in blood or exhaled breath, for example, that can be measured to accurately and reliably signal if a disease or disorder is present. Dr Ildefonso Rodriguez-Leyva and colleagues from the University of San Luis Potosi, Mexico, believe skin is a good candidate for uncovering hidden brain disorders. Skin has the same origin as brain tissue in the developing embryo and might, therefore, be a good window to what's going on in the mind in later life - at least at a molecular level - they reasoned. Post-mortem studies of people with Parkinson's also reveal that the same protein deposits which occur in the brain with this condition also accumulate in the skin. To test if the same was true in life as after death, the researchers recruited 65 volunteers - 12 who were healthy controls and the remaining 53 who had either Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's or another type of dementia. They took a small skin biopsy from behind the ear of each volunteer to test in their laboratory for any telltale signs of disease. Specifically, they looked for the presence of two proteins - tau and alpha-synuclein. © 2015 BBC.
Keyword: Alzheimers; Parkinsons
Link ID: 20612 - Posted: 02.25.2015
By JON PALFREMAN EUGENE, Ore. — FOUR years ago, I was told I had Parkinson's disease, a condition that affects about one million Americans. The disease is relentlessly progressive; often starting with a tremor in one limb on one side of the body, it spreads. The patient's muscles become more rigid, frequently leading to a stooped posture, and movements slow down and get smaller and less fluid. As the disease advances — usually over a number of years — the patient becomes more and more disabled, experiencing symptoms from constipation to sleep disorders to cognitive impairment. Can Parkinson's be slowed, stopped or even reversed? Can the disease be prevented before it starts, like polio and smallpox? More than at any time in history, success seems possible. Having sequenced the human genome, biomedical researchers have now set their sights on the ultimate frontier — the human brain. The formidable puzzle is to figure out how a three-pound lump of mostly fatty matter enables us to perform a seemingly endless number of tasks, like walking, seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, thinking, loving, hating, speaking and writing ... and why those awesome abilities break down with neurological disease. Many scientists view Parkinson's as a so-called pathfinder. If they can figure out what causes Parkinson's, it may open the door to understanding a host of other neurodegenerative diseases — and to making sense of an organ of incredible complexity. In Parkinson's, the circuitry in a tiny region of the brain called the basal ganglia becomes dysfunctional. Along with the cerebellum, the basal ganglia normally acts as a kind of adviser that helps people learn adaptive skills by classic conditioning — rewarding good results with dopamine bursts and punishing errors by withholding the chemical. Babies rely on the basal ganglia to learn how to deploy their muscles to reach, grab, babble and crawl, and later to accomplish many complex tasks without thinking. For example, when a tennis player practices a stroke over and over again, the basal ganglia circuitry both rewards and "learns" the correct sequence of activities to produce, say, a good backhand drive automatically. © 2015 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Parkinsons
Link ID: 20606 - Posted: 02.24.2015
By Sandra G. Boodman Catherine Cutter's voice was her livelihood. A professor of food science at Penn State University, the microbiologist routinely lectured to large classes about food safety in the meat and poultry industries. But in 2008, after Cutter's strong alto voice deteriorated into a raspy whisper, she feared her academic career might be over.How could she teach if her students could barely hear her? The classroom wasn't the only area of Cutter's life affected by her voicelessness. The mother of two teenagers, Cutter, now 52, recalls that she "couldn't yell — or even talk" to her kids and would have to knock on a wall or countertop to get their attention. Social situations became increasingly difficult as well, and going to a restaurant was a chore. Using the drive-through at her bank or dry cleaner was out of the question because she couldn't be heard. "I just retreated," said Cutter, who sought assistance from nearly two dozen specialists for her baffling condition. The remedies doctors prescribed — when they worked at all — resulted in improvement that was temporary at best. For two years Cutter searched in vain for help. It arrived in the form of a neurosurgeon she consulted for a second opinion about potentially risky surgery to correct a different condition. He suggested a disorder that had never been mentioned, a diagnosis that proved to be correct — and correctable. Until then, "everyone had been looking in the wrong place," Cutter said.
Keyword: Movement Disorders
Link ID: 20605 - Posted: 02.24.2015
By Gary Stix Everyone knows that ALS is a very bad disease, an awareness underscored by the recent Ice Bucket Challenge. The death of neurons that results in paralysis can be caused by specific genetic mutations. But in most cases, single genes are not the culprit. So researchers have looked for other risk factors that might play a role. Studies have tagged cigarette smoking as a definite danger. Alcohol, another plausible suspect, has yielded equivocal results in previous investigations. To get a better read on ethanol (some earlier studies were small), researchers from Sweden's Lund University looked at giant medical registries from that country, compiled at various times between 1973 and 2010. They found that individuals who were classified as problem drinkers were a little more than half as likely to be diagnosed with ALS as those who didn't have "alcohol use disorder." More than 420,000 problem drinkers were registered during the period surveyed—and there were 7965 patients who received an ALS diagnosis. The study, just reported in The European Journal of Neurology, controlled for gender, education and place of birth, among other factors. But it was unable to tell why drinking might help. It did lead, though, to a number of intriguing speculations. The researchers cited studies in rats, done by other groups, that indicated that ingestion of alcohol decreased the number of brain cells called astrocytes that bore high levels of a certain protein linked to the pathology of ALS. © 2015 Scientific American
Keyword: ALS-Lou Gehrig's Disease
; Glia
Link ID: 20562 - Posted: 02.07.2015
By Nick Lavars Keeping ourselves upright is something most of us shouldn't need to think a whole lot about, given we've been doing it almost our entire lives. But when it comes to dealing with more precarious terrain, like walking on ice or some sort of tight rope, you might think some pretty significant concentration is required. But researchers have found that even in our moments of great instability, our subconsciousness is largely responsible for keeping us from landing on our backsides. This is due to what scientists are describing as a mini-brain, a newly mapped bunch of neurons in the spinal cord which processes sensory information and could lead to new treatment for ailing motor skills and balance. "How the brain creates a sensory percept and turns it into an action is one of the central questions in neuroscience," says Martin Goulding, senior author of the research paper and professor at the Salk Institute. "Our work is offering a really robust view of neural pathways and processes that underlie the control of movement and how the body senses its environment. We're at the beginning of a real sea change in the field, which is tremendously exciting." The work of Goulding and his team focuses on how the body processes light touch, in particular the sensors in our feet that detect changes in the surface underfoot and trigger a reaction from the body. "Our study opens what was essentially a black box, as up until now we didn't know how these signals are encoded or processed in the spinal cord," says Goulding. "Moreover, it was unclear how this touch information was merged with other sensory information to control movement and posture."
Keyword: Movement Disorders
Link ID: 20561 - Posted: 02.07.2015
By Angelina Fanous After the height of the Ice Bucket Challenge last fall, I found myself at a dinner party where the conversation turned to A.L.S. — amyotrophic lateral sclerosis — the disease for which millions were dousing themselves to raise awareness and money. "Would you rather have A.L.S., Alzheimer's, or Parkinson's?" someone asked. All those diseases are devastating, but A.L.S. is unique in that it usually kills within two to three years of diagnosis. It was just a game to my friends, all of whom are in their 20s. Everyone chose A.L.S., agreeing that it would be the fastest and therefore easiest death. But I stayed silent. I hadn't yet told my friends that I had been diagnosed with A.L.S. in July — two months after my 29th birthday. Had I been healthy, I might have answered A.L.S., too. But since my diagnosis, all I have wanted is more time. When I first noticed I couldn't type with my left hand, the doctors narrowed down it down to two options: a treatable autoimmune disease or A.L.S. They initially began treating me for the autoimmune disease. About once a month, we shut down my immune system so it would stop attacking my central nervous system. But with no immune system I made regular visits to the E.R. "At least it's not A.L.S.," I consoled myself. When the treatment didn't work and the weakness spread to my left leg and right hand, A.L.S. was the only remaining possibility. Still, I did that socially acceptable but also borderline insane thing where I sought second, third and fourth opinions. I voluntarily subjected myself to excruciating medical tests. I got shocked with electricity, had my spinal fluid drained, and underwent a surgery to remove a piece of my muscles and nerves, all in the hopes of finding a different diagnosis. All of the tests confirmed the diagnosis of A.L.S. © 2015 The New York Times Company
Keyword: ALS-Lou Gehrig's Disease
Link ID: 20556 - Posted: 02.05.2015
by Bethany Brookshire The windup before the pitch. The take-away before the golf swing. When you learn to pitch a softball, swing a golf club or shoot a basketball, you learn that preparation is important. You also learn about follow-through — the upswing of the golf club or the bend in the elbow after a softball pitch. It's the preparation and the execution that get the ball across the plate, so why should we care about follow-through? In theory, once the ball has left your hands or sailed away from your club or racket, there's no movement you could make that could affect what happens next. So while some follow-through might be important to diffuse the energy you just put into your shot, it shouldn't really matter whether you swing your golf club up in an arc, whip it off to the side or club your opponent over the head with it. But follow-through is in fact quite important, and not just as an extension of the movements that preceded it. Consistent follow-through actually helps performance, reports neuroscientist Ian Howard and colleagues at the University of Plymouth in England. The finding gives coaches some science to back up their training, and helps scientists understand how the brain accesses motor memories. Howard has always been interested in how the brain learns movement tasks. "The first study we did looked at the preparation movement — you move backwards and then you move forwards [as in a golf swing]," he says. His lab found that the preparation before a particular motion had a strong effect on how our brains learn and recall motor movements. © Society for Science & the Public 2000 - 2015.
Keyword: Movement Disorders
Link ID: 20549 - Posted: 02.05.2015
By Lenny Bernstein Parkinson's Disease patients secretly treated with a placebo instead of their regular medication performed better when told they were receiving a more expensive version of the "drug," researchers reported Wednesday in an unprecedented study that involved real patients. The research shows that the well-documented "placebo effect" -- actual symptom relief brought about by a sham treatment or medication -- can be enhanced by adding information about cost, according to the lead author of the study. It is the first time that concept has been demonstrated using people with a real illness, in this case Parkinson's, a progressive neurological disease that has no cure, according to an expert not involved in the study. "The potentially large benefit of placebo, with or without price manipulations, is waiting to be untapped for patients with [Parkinson's Disease], as well as those with other neurologic and medical diseases," the authors wrote in a study published online Wednesday in the journal Neurology. But deceiving actual patients in a research study raised ethical questions about violating the trust involved in a doctor-patient relationship. Most studies in which researchers conceal their true aims or other information from subjects are conducted with healthy volunteers. This one was subjected to a lengthy review before it was allowed to proceed, and, in an editorial that accompanied the article, two other physicians wrote that "the authors do not mention whether there was any possible effect (reduction) on trust in doctors or on willingness to engage in future clinical research."
Keyword: Parkinsons; Pain & Touch
Link ID: 20542 - Posted: 02.02.2015
Ewen Callaway Since August 2014, more than 100 children and young adults in the United States have developed a mysterious paralysis. Many of them had fevers before losing strength in one or more limbs, and the cases coincided with a wider epidemic of a little-known respiratory pathogen. That virus, enterovirus D68 (EV-D68), is the leading candidate for the cause of the paralysis, which few children have recovered from. Yet researchers have not definitively linked the two, or determined how the virus could cause the children's symptoms. A study published on 28 January in The Lancet1 that describes a cluster of cases from Denver, Colorado, strengthens the link, but falls short of providing a 'smoking gun'. Here is what we know about the virus — and what scientists are trying to find out. It belongs to the enterovirus family, which includes poliovirus and the pathogens that cause common colds; it is most similar to the rhinoviruses that cause respiratory infections. Although EV-D68 was first isolated in the 1960s, it is relatively uncommon among enteroviruses circulating worldwide. However, since August 2014, the virus has been linked to more than 1,000 respiratory infections in the United States, some of them severe, and France has seen cases, too. John Watson, a medical epidemiologist at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia, says that last year, EV-D68 was the predominant type of enterovirus circulating in the country. "That's a first," he says. Genome sequencing2 of viruses recovered from respiratory cases in St Louis, Missouri, shows that the EV-D68 strain circulating in the United States is most closely related to viruses that caused a pneumonia-like illness in three children in Thailand in 20113. What is the evidence that links EV-D68 to the cases of paralysis? © 2015 Nature Publishing Group
Keyword: Movement Disorders
Link ID: 20533 - Posted: 01.29.2015
By SAM ROBERTS When he was just 5 years old, Thomas Graboys declared that he intended to become a doctor. As a young physician, he visited a nephew serving in the Peace Corps in Mauritania and remained for two months, treating dozens of patients a day. He skied and played tennis and joined fellow cardiologists as the drummer in a rock band called the Dysrhythmics. In Boston, he was famous as a member of the team that diagnosed the Celtics star Reggie Lewis's heart defect before he died abruptly on a basketball court. In short, "he was a medical version of one of Tom Wolfe's masters of the universe," one reviewer concluded after Dr. Graboys (pronounced GRAY-boys) published his autobiography. But barely 60, after experiencing horrific nightmares, frequently flailing in bed, losing his memory, suffering tremors and finally collapsing on his wedding day, he acknowledged that he was suffering from Parkinson's disease and the onset of dementia. He informed his patients that he had no choice but to close his practice. "My face is often expressionless, though I still look younger than my 63 years," he recalled in the autobiography, "Life in the Balance: A Physician's Memoir of Life, Love, and Loss With Parkinson's Disease and Dementia," which was published in 2008. "I am stooped," he continued. "I shuffle when I walk, and my body trembles. My train of thought regularly runs off the rails. There is no sugarcoating Parkinson's. There is no silver lining here. There is anger, pain, and frustration at being victimized by a disease that can to some extent be managed but cannot be cured." After managing for more than a decade, Dr. Graboys died on Jan. 5 at his home in Chestnut Hill, Mass., his daughter, Penelope Graboys Blair, said. The cause was complications of Lewy Body Dementia, which was diagnosed after his Parkinson's. He was 70. © 2015 The New York Times Company
Keyword: Parkinsons
Link ID: 20485 - Posted: 01.15.2015


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Alfa Romeo 4C at Geneva ON CHARGE: More than a show piece, it is hoped the production 4C will add to Alfa's global growth. Alfa is determined to march back into the hearts and minds of petrol heads around the world, it seems, with a host of exciting new products. Its latest reveal is the 4C Concept supercar study at the Geneva auto show and there are firm plans to sell the final version from 2012. Described by its proud parent as a concept that "represents the true essence of a sports car", the 4C Concept, or mini-8C Competizione if you will, enjoys pride of place on Alfa's Geneva show stand. LOTS OF CARBON True to earlier speculation, the new concept translates the classic two-seater, mid-engined, rear-wheel drive coupe formula into something more compact and accessible. The concept rides on a wheelbase that is shorter than 2.4m and has an overall length of around four metres. Like the feted 8C, the latest Alfa concept makes generous use of weight-saving carbon and aluminium for its components and for the chassis and body. The concept weighs less than 850kg, Alfa says, a factor that combined with track-friendly suspension and 40/60 weight distribution should make for lots of entertaining driving sessions. COMING SOON: According to Alfa, the production car derived from this concept should be available in 2012. Power, however, is sourced from the carmaker's 1750 turbo four-cylinder petrol engine with direct injection - seen in South Africa in the Giulietta Quadrifoglio Verde where it generates 173kW - mated to Alfa's TCT twin dry clutch transmission. Alfa quotes figures of under five seconds for the 0-100km/h sprint and claims a top speed for the concept in excess of 250km/h. And, unlike the 8C Competizione, production of the 4C will not be limited to 500 units… The production version of the latest Alfa stunner goes on sale in certain global markets in 2012 Alfa Romeo 4C GTA Concept: The Snake is Back New Alfa 4C GTA is designed to recall the T33 Stradale of 1967. Will it come to the U.S.? Perhaps. Will the new 4C herald the end of Alfa's Big Sleep? A new Alfa Romeo compact "supercar" which represents the true essence of the brand's values, made its debut at the the 81st Geneva International Motor Show. The new Alfa Romeo 4C GTA Concept is designed by Centro Stile Alfa Romeo, and has very rough lines where the body is put together. But all this purposely creates the engaging personality that is linked to that of the legendary 1967 Type 33 Stradale. The T33 Stradale was derived from the T33 competition car, which defended the colors of the Milanese automaker in the World Championship series. The 1967 T33 Stradale. Photo by Werner Pfister. To confirm that the new car inherits the moral legacy of the glorious T33, the 4C is a hi tech, hi performance 2-seater, rear-wheel drive that focuses on the power and on the exceptional lightness to give at the driver a true sporting feeling behind the wheel. While it appears a little chunky, the Alfa is on a very short 2.4 meter wheelbase and is mid-engined. Four cylinder engine will produce over 200 hp. But if the basic idea comes from the Type 33, it is also true that the new car is born from the experience acquired through the Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione and 8C Spider models, the supersportscar of which only 1000 were made between in 2007 and 2008 and sold at a price of 213,000 Euros. The 4C has a very compact layout to improve its agility: approximately 4 metres long and has a wheelbase of less than 2.4 metres. The engine is the 4 cylinder 1750 Turbo Petrol engine which is able to produce over 200 HP, and already used in the Giulietta Quadrifoglio Verde. The engineers did not declare the true power of the Concept engine, but, there is a rumour that it can produce about 265hp. The engine is fed by direct injection and has dual continuous variable valve timing, and a turbocharger with a revolutionary scavenging control system which eliminates turbo lag. Located centrally in the vehicle, the engine in the Alfa Romeo 4C Concept ensures performance better than a 3 liter car, and yet is able to delivering the moderate fuel consumption typical of a 4 cylinder engine. The engine is coupled with the new automatic "Alfa TCT" twin dry clutch transmission, launched only a few months ago on the MiTo and which will soon be available on the Giulietta. The 1750 Turbo petrol engine allows the 4C Concept to reach a top speed of over 250 km/h (155 mph) and to accelerate from 0 to 100km in under 5 seconds. The T33 Stradale next to the 8C. Photo by Werner Pfister. Reportedly, the 4C Concept has a sophisticated suspension layout (high quadrilateral at the front, MacPherson at the rear) to ensure maximum agility and road handling. This solution, along with the rear-wheel drive and the extraordinary weight/power ratio gives it the proverbial Alfa Romeo road handling. The weight distribution is 40% on the front axle and 60% on the rear axle. The Alfa Romeo Management has declared that this car is not simply an exercise in style created for the Motor Show; it will be on sale in the late 2012 and is meant to reinforce Alfa Romeo's global growth. It is rumoured that at least 20,000 will be built and the selling price will be between 40,000 and 50,000 Euros. Rear view is the least pleasing; curves, lines and motifs going every which way. The original Stradale is far superior in styling but the designed had more freedom in 1967. Alfa is still planning to come back to the U.S. and the centerpiece of this return promises to be something truly special. Judging by the looks of the new Alfa Romeo 4C Concept unveiled at the 2011 Geneva Motor Show, perhaps they are finally on the right path. Alfa Romeo MiTo MY 2011 Alfa Romeo MiTo 2011 MY Alfa Romeo presents the 81st International Motor Show in Geneva all the news about the myth, with improvements not only aesthetic but also technical and performance .'Alfa Romeo MiTo, awarded the title "European Car of 2009" is the Geneva International Motor Show to present the new 2011 range, which is marketed in most European countries from April. One of the main novelties of the new MiTo MY 2011 is the arrival of color "Bronze Metal", an intense color with red notes, with two-tone interior. Also with regard to the interior, the seats will consist of a new fabric, a sort of smooth and very fine elastic mesh, welded with a graphic two-tone bronze and black. A more elegant version so for a car that before did not lack certain style. The car shown in Geneva has just this combination of colors, and is a 1.4 Multiair Turbo 135 hp, with change "Alfa TCT. Then a car capable of giving intense emotions. On board, there is a portable navigation device "Blue & Me - Tom Tom" touch screen 4.3 ", also designed to facilitate the driver safety in the field, this being the voice control. This advanced navigator also has the ability to update maps on the web, thanks to "MapShare", a virtual community with more than 5 million users. Other MiTo in Geneva is the specimen bearing the famous Quadrifoglio Verde ", a symbol that over the years has marked the most sporting creations badged Alfa Romeo. Also, this version offers innovations to the public in Geneva, with a new front flange under the title, and new logos external "Quadrifoglio Verde" aluminum, with four-leaf clover in relief. The new seat has made more of a sport, and is a material designed to resist wear in an optimal manner. Also with regard to the interior, even the white green seams contribute to the general idea of elegance and sportiness. In addition to standard equipment, including the options have been increased and improved. Alloy wheels 18 "and sports seats Sabelt are among the major news, plus a new USB port and AUX-in. Obviously on this car is equipped with the most powerful engine in the range, the 1.4 Turbo 170 hp MultiAir. Also present was the Dynamic Suspension system, for better control of electronic shock absorbers. Alfa Romeo Pandion Alfa Romeo Pandion Bertone proposes that the Qatar Motor Show 2011 Pandion the fascinating sport, with its original doors and the 4.7-liter V8 engine The Italian coachbuilder Bertone is in the Qatar Motor Show 2011 with the 'Alfa Romeo Pandion, fascinating supercar. As mentioned, the spotlight shines in first for the UAE's concept car Pandion, the supercar made in a single copy to celebrate the centenary of Alfa Romeo. With the participation of the Qatar Motor Show, the Bertone confirms its vocation as a leading brand in the luxury sector, explicitly referring to their historical tradition as a manufacturer "tailoring" of unique pieces in the best tradition of Italian coach builders, handcrafted for a small circle of wealthy connoisseurs and collectors, eager to experience the car as a work and as an object of pure emotion. Pandion is the heart of a V8 over 450 horses is not ruled out the possibility of creating a single copy on a commission led by a powerful twelve-cylinder V Alfas Win Awards in Italy and Germany Credit Alfa Romeo Alfa Romeo kicked of the New Year by announcing that it received prestigious awards in Italy and Germany with the Giulietta and the MiTo, its two most successful models. The Giulietta was awarded two prizes; in Italy, it received the "Newcomer of the year 2011" awarded by "Quattroruote" heading the list of the ten most interesting cars launched in 2010, selected by the monthly Italian magazine and evaluated by the readership. The new Giulietta obtained almost 44% out of the over 103,000 votes expressed through postcards, SMS messages and on the Internet. This is a remarkable result when considering the gap between the Giulietta and the second and third prize winners: Audi A1 and Citroën DS3, which received respectively 12.46% and 8.9% of the vote. The prize was collected by Harald J. Wester, CEO of Alfa Romeo Automobiles on January 27th during the award ceremony that took place at Palazzo Mezzanotte, the headquarters of the Milan Stock Exchange. Credit Alfa Romeo In Germany, the Giulietta – as first-time nominee to the prestigious "Die Besten Autos" prize awarded by the specialist magazine "Auto Motor und Sport" – immediately won in the "compact" category. As in the previous case, the award was assigned by the magazine's readers. "Auto Motor und Sport" readership also awarded the MiTo, in the "mini" category, for the third consecutive year. Both cars also dominated the import cars ranking, thus adding new acknowledgments to the history of successes in the "Die Besten Autos" award: since 1976 (the first year the prize was awarded), Alfa Romeo cars have been declared the best performers in their respective categories no less than 29 times. The prize was collected by Manfred Kantner, CEO of Fiat Group Automobiles Germany AG. These prizes are additions to the already long list of recognitions that the Giulietta and the MiTo have received in recent months. Awarded the title of "Auto Europa 2011" by UIGA (the Italian Automotive Specialized Press Association) and the second prize in "Car of the Year 2011", but the first prize in the conventional engine category (to name only the most significant examples), the Alfa Romeo Giulietta is a powerful blend of performance, comfort and safety. The Giulietta offers top passenger room and comfort with its 5 comfortable seats and is the safest ever hatchback saloon according to Euro NCAP. All this becomes even more interesting when you consider the excellence of Alfa Romeo Giulietta engines as shown by the newest enhancements: the new 140 HP 2.0 JTDM power unit and "Alfa TCT", the next- generation twin dry clutch transmission by Alfa, in addition to the 1.4 MultiAir Turbo petrol. Credit Alfa Romeo The Alfa Romeo MiTo has received a considerable amount of awards as well. After being awarded the title of "Auto Europa 2009" in 2008, it received more than 20 international acknowledgments, spanning from Italy to Germany, from Poland to France and even Uruguay. This shows that the car appeals to and is appreciated by the specialized press and by the public alike. Credit Alfa Romeo
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Quality Inn
809 Hwy 332 West
Clute, TX 77531
Phone: (979) 265-5252
Fax: (979) 265-8185
Note: Distance is displayed as straight line from the city center or point of interest. Driving distance may vary.
Directions to Our Hotel:
From Highway 288/332 South: Make a u-turn on Main Street. Hotel on the right.
Directions to/from a nearby airport:
Bush/Intercontinental. Arpt. (IAH)To hotel › From hotel ›
Hobby Airport (HOU)To hotel › From hotel ›Brazosport Yellow CabGreyhound Bus Station
Hotel Latitude/Longitude:
Latitude: 29.010372 Longitude: -95.407143
Use these coordinates to locate this hotel when using a GPS device or web map.
|Brazosport Yellow Cab
|12.0mi/19.3km S
|Hobby Airport
|55.0mi/88.5km N
|Greyhound Bus Station
|60.0mi/96.6km N
|Bush/Intercontinental. Arpt.
|75.0mi/120.7km N
Earn valuable points toward free nights.


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6161 Strickland Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11234
Upon availability of lanes, cannot be combined with any other special,
not valid during holidays and school closings. Shoes: $4.25
All specials are priced as per person.
$3 Tuesdays
Nifty Fifty Special
EVERY Tuesday & Thursday
Noon - 4:00 pm
Cover charge: $6.00 Per Person
Shoes $4.25/Games only .50¢ Per Person
Bowling must be completed by 5 pm.
Not valid during Holidays and School Closings.
Thursday Night Owl Special
Silly Sunday Specials!
All Prices are Per Person


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Eve program: "I have four children of various ages and have struggled over the years to try to make Jesus more important during Christmas than Santa Claus." So what does this blogger do? "On Christmas Eve we focus exclusively on Christ. I've tried reenacting the Christmas story, among other things but what I love and have done for the last several years is to use the Christmas program in the church's Family Home Evening Manual. We usually invite another family over for dinner and I strongly encourage my children to perform some musical numbers, but the highlight of the evening is when we all sit down, open our scriptures and read the Christmas story interspersed with hymns and Christmas songs." And nicely, she has put together this Christmas program into pdf form to easily print and use. Click in to download for your family.
Eve movies: This blogger has been counting down the last week to Christmas with short movies produced by the church. Titled "A Week of Short Movies which Share the True Meaning of Christmas," this post is full of great resources, including "Wise Men Still Seek Him" and "The Greatest Gift" to incorporate into your Christmas Eve viewing. Enjoy!
Eve history: How did these missionaries celebrate the evening in 1900: "The people here have a great way of celebrating Christmas. They shoot away more [illegible: guns? fireworks?] than is shot on the 4th of July. We had plenty of it Christmas eve." Click to see other ways elders historically celebrated Christmas in the "Southern States Mission."
Eve ideas: Far from family, what does this family do on Christmas Eve? Make up their own traditions, invite friends over for a holiday meal and break bread with the local missionaries. Wow. Click in to find lots of good "Christmas Eve Ideas" and recipes for making the holiday more memorable.
Emily W. Jensen updates "Today in the Bloggernacle" on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, presenting the best from the world of LDS-oriented blog sites. Her extended "Bloggernacle Back Bench" appears on Tuesdays. Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
- Returning LDS missionary, father battling...
- Defending the Faith: Joseph, the stone and...
- 'A marvellous work and a wonder': A look back...
- LDS Church releases Easter video, campaign
- Why I don't call myself a 'Mormon...
- 18 must-see attractions on and around Temple...
- 'Amazed by Grace' by Sheri Dew explores...
- Heaven can wait, Christian bookstore chain says
- Defending the Faith: Joseph, the stone... 144
- Why I don't call myself a... 91
- 'A marvellous work and a wonder': A... 57
- What Mormons should know about NBC's... 51
- Kara Tippetts, Christian who blogged... 26
- Why Ted Cruz launched his presidential... 17
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"Jive allows us to bring all that together and have it in a one system that gives us the flexibility to manage all of these different aspects to our business."Read more
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Our top DVD picks for the week of February 27:
Bratz: Fashion Pixiez (Lions Gate)
Conversations With God (Fox)
Cool It Carol (Image)
Deep Red (Blue Underground)
Dreamland (Image)
Filmation's Ghostbusters (Brentwood)
George Carlin: Life Is Worth Losing (MPI)
Journey to the End of the Night (First Look)
Little Einsteins: The Legend of the Golden Pyramid (Disney)
Hawaii, Oslo (Film Movement)
The Heart of the Game (Miramax)
Hundra (Subversive)
The Land Before Time: The Great Day of the Flyers (Universal)
Magnum P.I.: The Complete Sixth Season (Universal)
Reno 911!: Reno's Most Wanted (Paramount)
The Return (Universal)
Secret Agent AKA Danger Man: The Complete Collection (A&E)
Shock (Blue Underground)
Stranger Than Fiction (Sony)
Tideland (ThinkFilm)
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Holistic Healing & Psychic Fair's
BodyLabUSA's goal is to bring awareness and education to everyone about Alternative Healing Choices and how they work within your lives. We are all using the One Universal Energy to help heal our bodies whether it be emotionally, spiritually, or physically.
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1992 Toyota Corolla
My car wont start I have a mobiliser on it I can active or deactive it by a small key, when I active or deactive it nothing happens. How can I remove the mobiliser pls help
June 28, 2012.
June 28, 2012.
I have no info on that car having an immobilizer from the factory however what do you mean by won't start? Do you mean engine turns over and won't start or you turn the key and nothing happens? Do you have a digital multi meter? If so we can do some tests.
Jun 28, 2012.
Jun 28, 2012.
What would be compatible to use for a replacement engine in my Breeze? I am just looking to get something that would work with it to get it up and running. Can I use a different model ...
1 answer • 1999 Plymouth Breeze • 120,000 miles
If i took out my 91 toyota carolla engine what other cars would it be compatible with?
4 answers • 1991 Toyota Corolla
We have two Jeeps that we need to replace the 4.0 engines on. a 1996 2 wheel drive and a 1998 4 wheel drive. We have found a 1994 2 wheel drive engine that we are planning on putting ...
2 answers • 1998 Jeep Laredo • 165,000 miles
1990 Toyota Camry mileage: 150,000. 1. The oil warning light is on. 2. There are four quarts of oil in the car. 3. The oil filter is dry. 4. The engine sounds rough. 5. There is noise ...
3 answers • 1990 Toyota Camry • 150,000 miles


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Quiz: Remember the definition of mal de mer?
1680s, probably from earlier suffe (1590s), of uncertain origin. Originally used in reference to the coast of India, hence perhaps of Indic origin. Or perhaps a phonetic respelling of sough, which meant "a rushing sound."
Yes; certainly; willingly: Sure thing I'll go with you (1896+)
("Internet surfing") Used by analogy to describe the ease with which an expert user can use the waves of information flowing around the Internet to get where he wants. The term became popular in the early 1990s as access to the Internet became more widespread and tools such as World-Wide Web browsers made its use simpler and more pleasant.