Latest White matter Stories

PITTSBURGH, Dec. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- Carnegie Mellon University scientists Timothy Keller and Marcel Just have uncovered the first evidence that intensive instruction to improve reading skills in young children causes the brain to physically rewire itself, creating new white matter that improves communication within the brain. (Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20020422/CMULOGO ) As the researchers report today in the journal Neuron, brain imaging of children between the ages of 8 and...

For years, researchers have suggested teens who exhibit risky and destructive behaviors may be influenced by underdeveloped brains. New research suggests just the opposite.A new study suggests teenagers who engage in risky behaviors develop more mature white matter tracts in the brain at a younger age. Normally, by a person's mid-twenties, white matter becomes dense and organized, signaling full maturity of the brain. In the study, conducted at Emory University and the Emory School of...

A new study using brain imaging to study teen behavior indicates that adolescents who engage in dangerous activities have frontal white matter tracts that are more adult in form than their more conservative peers.The brain goes through a course of maturation during adolescence and does not reach its adult form until the mid-twenties. A long-standing theory of adolescent behavior has assumed that this delayed brain maturation is the cause of impulsive and dangerous decisions in adolescence....

Abnormalities in the fibers connecting different brain areas may contribute to muscle disorders such as writer's cramp, according to a report in the April issue of Archives of Neurology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.Previous studies of individuals with writer's cramp have identified changes in the gray matter of several brain areas, according to background information in the article. These include the basal ganglia (structures that help control and start movement), sensorimotor cortex...

UCLA researchers find that genes determine brain's processing speedThey say a picture tells a thousand stories, but can it also tell how smart you are? Actually, say UCLA researchers, it can.In a study published in the Journal of Neuroscience Feb. 18, UCLA neurology professor Paul Thompson and colleagues used a new type of brain-imaging scanner to show that intelligence is strongly influenced by the quality of the brain's axons, or wiring that sends signals throughout the brain. The faster...

Adolescents and young adults who are heavy users of marijuana are more likely than non-users to have disrupted brain development, according to a new study. Pediatric researchers found abnormalities in areas of the brain that interconnect brain regions involved in memory, attention, decision-making, language and executive functioning skills. The findings are of particular concern because adolescence is a crucial period for brain development and maturation.The researchers caution that the study...

Scientists at New York University School of Medicine report in a new study that they have identified the molecular switch that turns on the production of myelin, the fatty insulation around nerve cells that ensures swift and efficient communication in the nervous system. The study, published in the September 1, 2005, issue of the journal Neuron, may provide a new avenue for treating nervous system diseases such as multiple sclerosis, which are associated with damage to myelin. A team led by...

PORTLAND, Ore. -- Oregon Health & Science University researchers have identified some of the key factors that prevent the repair of brain damage caused by multiple sclerosis (MS), complications of premature birth, and other diseases and conditions. The findings offer important clues about why the nervous system fails to repair itself and suggest ways that at least some forms of brain damage could be reversed. The research is published in the August edition of the scientific journal Nature...