Brain

SAN DIEGO —New animal research has identified factors, such as the stress response and immune system, that may play important roles in depression. Scientists have also found that the regulation of nerve cell signals influences depression in animals, and that new drug combinations may more effectively treat it. The findings were presented at Neuroscience 2010, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience and the world's largest source of emerging news on brain science and health.

At ages 1 and 1-1/2, children who get most of their sleep at night (as opposed to during the day) do better in a variety of skill areas than children who don't sleep as much at night.

That's the finding of a new longitudinal study conducted by researchers at the University of Montreal and the University of Minnesota. The research appears in the November/December 2010 issue of the journal Child Development.

Mums who smoke heavily while pregnant run the risk of having kids who grow up to become repeat criminal offenders, suggests research published online in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.

The findings held true, even after taking account of a comprehensive range of family and social factors, such as mental ill health and deprivation, which are likely to influence behaviours, the research showed.

The traditional way to predict whether children can regain movement after spinal cord injuries may exclude a small subset of patients who could benefit from therapy, according to two studies presented by University of Florida researchers at the Society for Neuroscience meeting this week in San Diego.

In one study, researchers present details of a child with incomplete spinal cord injury who continues to improve four years after recovering walking ability in a locomotor training program at UF, even though clinical assessment tools predicted he would never walk again.

The handwriting problems that affect children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are likely to continue into their teenage years, according to a study from the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore, Md. The research is published in the November 16, 2010 issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

An autism study by Yale School of Medicine researchers using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has identified a pattern of brain activity that may characterize the genetic vulnerability to developing autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Published today in the early edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the study could eventually lead to earlier and more accurate autism diagnosis.