Latest Dopamine Stories

12-month treatment may impact adult ADHD patients' response to methylphenidate Long-term treatment of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) with certain stimulant medications may alter the density of the dopamine transporter, according to research published May 15 in the open access journal PLOS ONE by Gene-Jack Wang and colleagues from Brookhaven National Laboratory and the intramural program at NIH. ADHD is commonly treated using drugs to target dysfunctional dopamine...

NEW YORK, May 14, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Intra-Cellular Therapies, Inc. ("ITI"), a biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of therapeutics for CNS disorders, is pleased to announce the appointment of Professor Sir Michael Rawlins, MD, FRCP, FMedSci, to its board of directors. Sir Michael is an internationally respected figure in the field of drug safety, clinical effectiveness and cost effectiveness having been Chairman of the UK's National Institute for Clinical...

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online Although trends are pointing to a decrease in recent years, cocaine use is still a major problem in the US, with 1.5 million users in 2010 – according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). To combat this highly addictive illegal drug, researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College are developing an “anti-cocaine vaccine” designed to keep the drug from creating the dopamine-induced high in the...

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Researchers writing in the journal Neurology say they have found an explanation for the ties between sleepless nights and restless legs syndrome (RLS). John Hopkins researchers used an MRI to snap images of the brain, and they found that a neurotransmitter involved in arousal known as glutamate is abnormally high in people suffering RLS. They saw that the more glutamate found in the brains of people with RLS, the worse they slept....

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports - Your Universe Online Mothers who regularly consume high-fat, high-sugar foods while pregnant effectively program their children to be addicted to junk food by the time they are weaned, researchers from the University of Adelaide have discovered. Laboratory studies led by Dr. Bev Mühlhäusler, a postdoctoral fellow in the university's FOODplus Research Centre, discovered that a diet high in fatty or sugary foods during pregnancy and lactation...

Alan McStravick for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Here in the latter days of April, much of the nation and the world is struggling to once and for all escape the cold grasp of the long arm of winter. For many, their mental health can be affected by the shorter hours of daylight. Whether you refer to the condition as the ‘winter blues’ or the ‘black dogs,’ or even the more formal title of ‘seasonal affective disorder’ (SAD), going for an extended period of time with a...

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports - Your Universe Online Using deep brain stimulation (DBS) in a specific area of the brain appears to reduce caloric intake and lead to weight loss in obese mice prone to binge eating, according to new research published in the Journal of Neuroscience, the official Journal of the Society of Neuroscience. Senior author Tracy L. Bale, an associate professor of neuroscience at the University Pennsylvania's School of Veterinary Medicine's Department of...

Researchers at Northeastern University in Boston have developed a gene therapy approach that may one day stop Parkinson's disease (PD) in it tracks, preventing disease progression and reversing its symptoms. The novelty of the approach lies in the nasal route of administration and nanoparticles containing a gene capable of rescuing dying neurons in the brain. Parkinson's is a devastating neurodegenerative disorder caused by the death of dopamine neurons in a key motor area of the brain, the...

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports - Your Universe Online The taste of beer can trigger dopamine release in a person’s brain, even without any effect from the alcohol it contains, researchers from the Indiana University School of Medicine have discovered. The IU researchers recruited 49 men and used a pair of positron emission tomography (PET) scans to test for increased activity of the brain neurotransmitter which has been linked to drinking and other drugs of abuse. The first scan...

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online Listening to good music can trigger the same reaction in our brains as eating a good meal, taking a psychoactive drug or enjoying an evening of passion, researchers from McGill University in Montreal claim in a new study. The research, which was published in the journal Science, reported the nucleus accumbens is the part of the brain that is most closely associated with the enjoyment a person experiences when listening to a...