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Human Behavior

Human Behavioral Complexity Peaks at Age 25 – Inverse

When it comes to your brains ability to digest, process, and spit out a good decision in the fastest possible time, you peak at 25, according to a study published in PLOS on Thursday titled Human Behavioral Complexity Peaks at Age 25.

After that, our neural processing of rapid-fire, high cognition goes down, says Hector Zenil, a computer scientist at Stockholms Karolinska Institute and a co-author of the study. You decline very slowly, he assures Inverse. But at 60, you see a strong decline in cognitive tasks like solving programs, puzzles, and problems.

To be clear, what Zenil and his colleagues are measuring is not impulsivity or intelligence, but rather how quickly and well a person can recognize random patterns, what Zenil describes as an algorithmic nature of human behavior that had not been explored before. That might seem like a useless skill, but think about how much of your daily life relies on figuring out patterns memorizing phone numbers or addresses, figuring out which spot on a train you can stand in, zigzagging home in a storm, figuring out which portion of a crowded gym floor to claim as your own. These sorts of patterns play out in fields like cryptography, hacking, and yes, computer science.

The seemingly simple task of making fast decisions out of random pattern recognition is a key indicator of neural health, and Zenil says that the data clearly points to 25-year-olds as the possessors of peak behavioral complexity.

This is a sort of reverse Turing test, where we tested the likelihood of human-generated patterns versus the likelihood of computer program-generated patterns, Zenil says. At a certain age, people beat computer programs best, with some people generating the most random patterns at 25 that only the most diligent computer programs were able to generate.

This reverse Turing test asked 3,249 participants aged between 9 and 91 and recruited through social media, radio, and a popular science magazine ad to complete five tests that looked at how quickly and well participants performed random item generation tasks: creating a series of coin tosses that looked random to everyone else but wasnt; guessing which card would appear next after a shuffle; creating a random-looking sequence that resembled what a person would roll with dice; pointing to one of nine circles appearing repeatedly on a screen; and filling a grid that looked randomly patterned.

Heres a video of how scientists implemented the test.

Zenil says that these seemingly inane puzzles were a reflection of chaos theory, a branch of mathematics that deals with how sensitive, complex systems can drastically alter with the slightest change. They were all given the same instructions, Zenil says. No other factor other than age produced these patterns with statistic randomness.

Zenil and his team made sure to isolate other factors that might have played a role in pointing to behavioral complexity superiority. They checked to see if language and therefore culture played a role, testing in Spanish, English, French, and German with large swaths of people who spoke those languages natively and another group whose second languages were those languages. That didnt make a difference. The team isolated education, which is correlated with economic class, and found that that didnt make a difference either. They considered gender and found that, nope, that didnt make a difference either.

In other words, it really was age that correlated with behavioral complexity, and 25 emerged as the peak age for these sorts of random decisions.

So what purpose do fast pattern recognition skills serve? If youre an animal, it means you can outsmart predators who might try to hunt and devour you you can slip into brush, take an unexpected turn, hide in a crevice. For humans, there is some evolutionary advantage to thinking fast in randomness, Zenil says, arguing that despite us not having to worry about predators or other clans of traveling nomads attacking us at night, fast random thinking can be useful in a modern economy that values creativity. The more randomness you produce, the more access you have to more powerful tools to come up with something new, he says, pointing to jobs ranging from the stock market to advertising to even science. The ability to switch methods quickly in a fast-paced world in a creative way is helpful and can pay dividends down the line.

For those freaking out about the state of their neural decline right now, rest assured its not all bad news. At 25, after all, youre still growing out of the impulsiveness that probably defined your puberty and youre coming into your adult brain, going through a second puberty of sorts on a neurological level. The tradeoff of being able to make random decisions so effectively at 25 is the fact that you really dont know much about the world, Zenil points out. This isnt just because youre wiser as an older person; as you age, youre better able to corral your brain into creative zones and know where you excel in concentrating your efforts. At 25, this isnt the case. And thats a tradeoff thats not really bad, Zenil points out.

Photos via Derbeth / Flickr

Tanya Basu is the Science editor at Inverse. Her writing focuses on the social sciences and behavior. Now based in Brooklyn, she will always call Chicago home and never be too full for one more taco.

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Human Behavioral Complexity Peaks at Age 25 - Inverse

Genetics

Myriad Genetics (MYGN) Says Study Finds Wide Gap in Quality of BRCA1/2 Variant Classification – StreetInsider.com

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Myriad Genetics, Inc. (NASDAQ: MYGN), a leader in molecular diagnostics and personalized medicine, today announced that new data comparing BRCA1 and BRCA2 variant classifications between Myriad Genetics and a commonly used public genetic database was published in the journal The Oncologist.1 A key finding was that the public database provided discrepant variant classifications more than 26 percent of the time, which can introduce uncertainty and diminish patient care.

The study, done in collaboration with William Gradishar, M.D., from the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University, evaluated 4,250 BRCA1 and BRCA2 variants. Overall, 73.2 percent of variant classifications analyzed were fully concordant, while 26.7 percent were not. Most of the discordant classifications had definitive classifications of pathogenic or benign from Myriad, compared to variant of uncertain significance (VUS) classifications in the public database.

The high degree of discordance seen in this study signals a cautionary note. As a repository of actual patient results, it means that different labs are providing different results to patients for the same genetic mutation. By definition, this means that some patients are receiving incorrect results that may have life-changing or -threatening implications, said Dr. Gradishar. The discordance observed within these databases between labs also highlights why public databases do not accommodate the consistent standard of variant classification needed for clinical use. Although efforts are underway to resolve the quality problems within public databases, it is unlikely the issue will be resolved soon and users of public databases likely will continue to encounter discrepancies. At this time, labs should not use public databases in any way in clinical variant classification.

These findings are consistent with previously published studies. A study by Vail et al. compared the interpretation of more than 2,000 BRCA1/2 variants among five public databases and found substantial disparity of variant classifications among and within publicly accessible variant databases.2 For VUSs in particular, there is no agreement once the variant is observed in a least four of the five databases in this study. Another study by Balmana et al. assessed conflicting interpretations of genetic variants in the Prospective Registry of Multiplex Testing (PROMPT) and found significant conflicting interpretations of genetic variants in that database.3 Specifically, among variants entered into the PROMPT registry database with classifications from multiple labs, 26 percent had discrepant classifications; 36 percent of which would affect patient management.

There are important clinical implications concerning the high VUS and discordance rates observed in public databases, said Johnathan Lancaster, M.D., Ph.D., chief medical officer, Myriad Genetic Laboratories. Dr. Gradishars findings reinforce the need for clinical laboratories to invest in meticulous research so that patients can receive the appropriate medical interventions. Over the past 25 years, Myriad has made substantial investments and published more than 8,000 definitively classified variants in peer reviewed publications as well as the details of our variant classification programs to advance the science of variant classification.

A recent study published by Kurian et al. showed that many surgeons manage patients with BRCA1/2 VUS the same as patients with BRCA1/2 pathogenic mutations and that half of average-risk patients with VUS undergo bilateral mastectomy.4 The analysis by Gradishar et al. found that in cases where other commercial laboratories had a VUS classification in the database, 40 to 60 percent of these variants have a definitive classification (pathogenic or benign) by Myriad, which may have helped to avoid many unnecessary surgeries.

Myriads ability to more definitively classify genetic variants stems from its proprietary myVision Variant Classification Program and more than 25-years of experience.

Variant classification is a complicated endeavour and multiple studies have shown that it matters when patients are tested by laboratories that have not invested in the necessary research but are dependent in part on public databases, said Dr. Lancaster. Myriad is the unquestioned leader in genetic testing for hereditary cancers. Over the last 25-years, Myriad has delivered millions of test results, which means the myVision program is based on the largest and most robust database in the industry to identify, classify, and assign clinical significance to genetic variants.

Key features of the myVision variant classification program include:

Follow Myriad Genetics on Twitter via @MyriadGenetics to stay informed about news and updates about the Company.

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Myriad Genetics (MYGN) Says Study Finds Wide Gap in Quality of BRCA1/2 Variant Classification - StreetInsider.com

Genetics

Genetics and stress interact to shape human health and well-being – University of Wisconsin-Madison

This is a story of nature and nurture.

Scientists at the University of WisconsinMadisons Waisman Center have shown one way in which human genetics and chronic stress interact to shape health and well-being later in life.

According to the study, published recently April 13 in the American Journal of Medical Genetics: Neuropsychiatric Genetics, individuals who both have specific variations of a particular gene called fragile X mental retardation 1, or FMR1, and experience higher levels of stress throughout their adulthood face poorer health and more physical and cognitive challenges when older.

In this era of precision medicine, its vital that we understand why some people may have more health symptoms or functional limitations later in life than others, says Marsha Mailick, UWMadison vice chancellor for research and graduate education, Waisman Center investigator and lead author of the study.

Marsha Mailick

The FMR1 gene contains varying numbers of a DNA pattern called a CGG triplet repeat. The letters refer to nucleotides, which form the building blocks of DNA. In humans, the most common number of CGG repeats in this gene is 30. Repeat numbers higher than 200 lead to fragile X syndrome, a rare genetic condition that causes intellectual disability and behavioral, physical and learning challenges.

The researchers looked at CGG repeat numbers in more than 5,500 people drawn from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study, a long-term study funded by the National Institutes of Health. They represented a random sample of men and women who graduated from Wisconsin high schools in 1957. All of them were parents and they averaged 71 years of age.

A subset of these parents had adult children with developmental or mental health disabilities; the rest had adult children who did not have chronic disabilities.

While all parenting is both stressful and joyful, parents of children with disabilities face some unique challenges throughout the lifespan, says Mailick. Over time the stress of parenting a child with disabilities can add up.

Mailick and her colleagues categorized parents of children with disabilities as a high-stress group and explored whether they faced more health challenges compared to a lower-stress group parents of children without disabilities.

The results were complex. Many of the parents in the high-stress group did show poorer health and well-being compared to the lower-stress group, but others did not. Whether the parents faced more physical and cognitive challenges when older was dependent on their numbers of FMR1 CGG repeats.

Parents in the high-stress group who also had either significantly more than or significantly fewer than 30 CGG repeats in their FMR1 gene were less healthy and faced more limitations in old age compared to parents of children without disabilities.

But for people with about 30 CGG repeats, their level of stress doesnt differentiate their health and wellbeing, says Mailick.

The researchers also found that in the lower-stress group, individuals with significantly more than or fewer than 30 CGG repeats actually had better health and fewer limitations than those with the normal number of CGG repeats.

This shows that its not only about genetics and not only about the environment, but how the two interact and together affect human health, says Mailick.

Researchers call this the flip-flop effect or differential susceptibility, where people with the same genetic background can have very different life outcomes depending on their environments.

Some people thrive in any environment, but others, with different genetic profiles, may find their health and well-being more susceptible to their circumstances and surroundings, says Mailick.

The study is also an example of how research that started by focusing on a rare genetic condition fragile X syndrome can lead to insights about variation in the general population, Mailick adds.

She would like to expand the study to a larger and more diverse population, and use new techniques and tools in population genetics and precision medicine to help. Our goal is to find out what we can do today to make tomorrow better, she says.

Other authors of the study include Paul Rathouz, chair of biostatistics and medical informatics at UWMadison, Jan Greenberg, associate vice chancellor for research and graduate education, Mei Baker at the Wisconsin State Lab of Hygiene, and Jinkuk Hong and Leann Smith DaWalt. All co-authors are affiliated with the UWMadison Waisman Center.

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Genetics and stress interact to shape human health and well-being - University of Wisconsin-Madison

Biochemistry

Chemistry student wins Iota Sigma Pi award – Huntington Herald Dispatch

HUNTINGTON - Whether she is winning prestigious awards from the national honor society for women in chemistry or traveling across the U.S. to present her biochemistry research, Amanda Smythers is setting the standard for what it means to be a young scholar.

Smythers, a 27-year-old biochemistry student from Huntington, has received Iota Sigma Pi's Members At Large Re-entry Award, which recognizes excellence in chemistry achieved by a woman at the graduate or undergraduate level, according to a news release from the university.

In addition to receiving the award, she was invited to present her research at the 2017 Posters on the Hill, a competitive event held in Washington, D.C. The program gives students the opportunity to showcase their research to congressional members, meet with their representatives and learn about advocacy for undergraduate research. Out of hundreds of applications to the program, only 60 are chosen to present their research.

"It really is such a great opportunity to have our research shown on a national platform," Smythers said in the release. "Since they take so few abstracts, I did not think I stood much of a chance, but here we are. It is so important for our national leaders to understand the importance of our work and recognize the quality of research Marshall University contributes to the field."

As a non-traditional student who returned to Marshall with no intention of establishing a career in research, Smythers said she was initially surprised when she found a real passion in chemistry.

"I am excited to share my experiences and show people how great the chemistry program is here. In addition to the funding I received from NASA, I received two scholarships from our chemistry department as well as the summer research fellowship. They have also funded me to travel to a variety of conferences around the U.S., including conferences in Cincinnati, San Diego, Philadelphia and Chicago," Smythers said.

While in Washington, D.C., for the 2017 Posters on the Hill event, Smythers will present research that focuses on making microalgae a more efficient stock for biofuel production. Smythers and her faculty mentor, Dr. Derrick Kolling, will have the opportunity to present their research April 26.

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Chemistry student wins Iota Sigma Pi award - Huntington Herald Dispatch

Anatomy

‘Anatomy of Gray’ puts ‘interesting twist’ on Midwestern small town – Portland Tribune

The upcoming Tigard Mask and Mirror production is billed as a 'children's play for adults.'

Sarah Ominski brought the play "Anatomy of Gray," by Jim Leonard Jr., with her on a beach vacation about a year and a half ago. Before she even finished reading the opening dedication, she was hooked.

"I get teary-eyed just thinking about it," said Ominski, who is directing the upcoming production of "Anatomy of Gray" for Mask and Mirror Community Theater in Tigard.

That dedication was about Leonard's friend John Geter, an actor who died of AIDS in the early 1990s. Leonard tried to write something for his friend shortly after his death, but found it too difficult so he put the project away for about 10 years, until he was finally prompted by a dream to finish "Anatomy of Gray."

Both Leonard and Geter were from small Midwestern towns, and Geter's family and hometown neighbors found it difficult to accept the cause of his death, because AIDS was then seen as disease specific to gay men.

"They were upset that he was dying," Ominski said, "yet they were disturbed what he was dying from."

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'Anatomy of Gray' puts 'interesting twist' on Midwestern small town - Portland Tribune

Anatomy

The iPhone Is a Part of Human Anatomy – NYU Washington Square News

Henry Cohen, Staff Writer April 17, 2017

Human dependency on the smartphone has become an accepted part of life in the first world. iPhone Separation Anxiety is a very real effect of being deprived of your smartphone for extended periods of time. Trivial as it may sound, not having your phone within reach can result in higher blood pressure, increased heart rate, worsened anxiety and poor cognitive performance, according to Psychology Today.

In a CBS Newsinterview, addictive behavior psychologist Dr. Harris Stratyner said that many people subconsciously treat smartphones as an extension of their bodies. We can literally feel almost as if we are disembodied from an extension of ourselves, Stratyner said, We dont feel the same ability to be individuals that we are with our iPhone, because we have become so dependent on that being a part of our knowledge base. Smartphones have become a huge part of how as much as 77 percent of American adults, according to a Pew Research Center 2017 study, interact with the world. They perfect our perception of time, give us full access to the wealth of human knowledge that is the internet, remind us of appointments, communicate with anyone, anywhere, at any time they can even tell us what the weather is going to be tomorrow at 3 p.m. In short, they are enhancements to our human abilities that manifest themselves in a slim block of metal and glass.

It may be difficult to see the iPhone as a true part of the human anatomy, but it is no different than a prosthetic leg or glass eye. It is always at hand, not physically a part of us but rarely apart from our person in much the same way that a prosthetic leg can be removed but is a part of the body when it is attached. Both the leg and smartphone serve to make up for some deficiency in the person who uses them. In the case of the prosthetic, it is the lack of a leg, while in the case of the phone, it is mans inability to naturally perform tasks such as taking photos and playing music wherever they are.

Transhumanist thinkers like Zoltan Istvan and Daniel Dennett have long advocated for and predicted the rise of a new brand of humanity, one enhanced by technology such that we can effectively accelerate our own evolution. While some outspoken critics like Francis Fukuyama have decried the dangers of transhumanism, this process is clearly already underway. Is having all earthly knowledge at our fingertips comparable to having a superpower? What about a human who can participate in a dozen text conversations at once spanning hundreds of miles in an instant? The smartphone represents the first and most successful step towards an entirely new variety of human, one that is almost a different species from those that came before and is capable of anything.

Opinions expressed on the editorial pages are not necessarily those of WSN, and our publication of opinions is not an endorsement of them. A version of this article appeared in the Monday, April 17 print edition.

Email Henry Cohen at [emailprotected]

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The iPhone Is a Part of Human Anatomy - NYU Washington Square News

Anatomy

Small Screen: Nurse professionally trained for Grey’s Anatomy role – Times Colonist

You have questions. I have some answers.

Q: I am a fan of Greys Anatomy and have watched it from the beginning. In all the operating-room scenes, the scrub nurse is a constant. Is she a technical adviser or someone special to the cast?

A: That role, of nurse Bokhee, is played by a woman also named Bokhee. Former Greys co-star Sandra Oh pointed out in a tweet several years ago that Bokhee has also been a surgical nurse in real life. Added Oh: Shes like my second mom, shes the best.

Q: I thought this year would feature a season finale for Doc Martin. Whats up?

A: I get a lot of questions about the whereabouts British series Doc Martin, which operates on one of those British well-make-more-when-were-ready schedules. Heres what recent reports have indicated: There will be two more seasons. An eighth, which began production in March, will air overseas later in 2017 before coming to the U.S. airwaves late this year or early in 2018. Then the show will take a break to prepare for a ninth season which, at this writing, expects to be the series last. That ninth season will air in the U.K. in 2019 and here in 2020.

Q: How did the song for I Married Joan go? It was a 50s sitcom with Jim Backus and Joan Davis. I remember I married Joan/What a girl/What a whirl/What a wife ... You cant deny/Thats why I married Joan.

A: I Married Joan originally aired from 1952 to 1955 and starred Backus and Davis as husband and wife; it was in the vein of I Love Lucy, which had premiered in 1951. You can find old episodes on YouTube, which is how I gathered these song lyrics: I married Joan/What a girl, what a whirl, what a life./Oh, I married Joan/What a mind, love is blind, what a wife./Giddy and gay, all day she keeps my heart laughin/Never know where her brain has flown./To each his own/Cant deny thats why I married Joan.

Q: Could you please tell me who the new Georgia Gold KFC Col. Sanders is?

A: That would be the actor Billy Zane. You may remember his villainous turn in Titanic.

Q: Please tell me about Ken Wahl, who was on the TV show Wiseguy. Ive been watching the reruns, and what a great show! When was it on, and where is Ken Wahl now?

A: Wiseguy originally aired on CBS from 1987 to 1990. Wahl, now 62, played Vinnie Terranova, an undercover fed pretending to be a mobster. Jonathan Banks, more recently seen on Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, was Vinnies handler. As good as they could be, the show was also known for its narrative arcs stories continued over several episodes and for its casting, including a then-little-known Kevin Spacey as a villain.

No fan of Hollywood, Wahl had a reputation for being difficult and left the show before its final season (Steven Bauer became the new wiseguy); he returned as Vinnie for a TV movie in 1996, but thats his last listed acting credit on the Internet Movie Database. According to a story in the Huffington Post in 2013, Wahl suffered a broken neck and severe spinal injury in 1992 following a fall down a flight of stairs after a romantic dalliance. (Wahl initially claimed he had had a motorcycle accident, keeping the dalliance secret.) The injuries left him in so much pain, even after operations, which he told the Post were botched, that his acting career was cut short.

More recently he has done some work on behalf of several charities he supports ? as you can see in his tweets as @KenWahl1. You may also want to look for some of his movies, especially The Wanderers and Fort Apache, The Bronx.

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Small Screen: Nurse professionally trained for Grey's Anatomy role - Times Colonist

Neuroscience

This Week in Neuroscience News 4/16/17 – ReliaWire

More brain stimulation news came this week when researchers at the University of Zurich pinpointee the brain mechanism that regulates decisions between honesty and self-interest. Using transcranial direct current stimulation, they could even increase honest behavior.

The work highlights a deliberation process between honesty and self-interest in the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (rDLPFC).

Christian Ruff, UZH Professor of Neuroeconomics, said:

This finding suggests that the stimulation mainly reduced cheating in participants who actually experienced a moral conflict, but did not influence the decision making process in those not in those who were committed to maximizing their earnings. These brain processes could lie at the heart of individual differences and possibly pathologies of honest behavior

When researchers applied transcranial direct current stimulation over a region in the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, during a dice rolling task, participants were less likely to cheat. However, the number of consistent cheaters remained the same. (Michel Andr Marchal, et al. Increasing honesty in humans with noninvasive brain stimulation)

Another story featuring the prefrontal cortex showed that its neurons helped teach the hippocampus to process memories. The research looked at memory flexibility and interference, the mechanisms by which the brain interprets events and anticipates their likely outcomes.

The study was by Matthew Shapiro, PhD, from Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. The results suggest that neurons in the medial prefrontal cortex instruct hippocampal neurons to learn rules which differentiate memory-based predictions in otherwise identical situations. The mechanisms revealed could improve understanding of psychiatric conditions, such as schizophrenia, that involve hippocampal and prefrontal cortex interactions.

NIH-funded research involving 446 children reported that insight into differences in treatment response in patients with childhood absence epilepsy could come from precision medicine. Childhood absence epilepsy (CAE) is the most common form of pediatric epilepsy.

The results suggest knowledge of specific gene variants in children with CAE may help predict what drugs would work best for them. For example, two specific forms of the calcium channel genes appeared more often in children for whom ethosuximide did not work. Two other variants of the calcium channel genes were found in children for whom lamotrigine did work, but one form of the drug transporter gene was associated with a continuation of seizures. (Glauser TA et al. Pharmacogenetics of Antiepileptic Drug Efficacy in Childhood Absence Epilepsy. Annals of Neurology. March 25, 2017)

A new study published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences hones our understanding of a uniquely human skill; the ability to instantaneously assess a new environment and get oriented thanks to visual cues.

Whereas humans can look at a complex landscape like a mountain vista and almost immediately orient themselves to navigate its multiple regions over long distances, other mammals such as rodents orient relative to physical cues like approaching and sniffing a wall that build up over time.

The way humans navigate their surroundings and understand their relative position includes an environment-dependent scaling mechanism, an adaptive coordinate system with differences from other mammals, according to the study led by researchers at The University of Texas at Austin.

Our research, based on human data, redefines the fundamental properties of the internal coordinate system,

said Zoltan Nadasdy, lead author of the study and an adjunct assistant professor in the universitys Department of Psychology.

Dysfunction in this system causes memory problems and disorientation, such as we see in Alzheimers disease and age-related decline. So, its vital that we continue to further our understanding of this part of the brain, he said.

By measuring brain activity in the entorhinal cortex, researchers identified three previously unknown traits of the system:

(Zoltan Nadasdy et al. Context-dependent spatially periodic activity in the human entorhinal cortex)

A pair of preclinical studies suggest that silencing the SCA2 gene, using antisense oligonucleotide therapy, may help prevent neurological symptoms associated with spinocerebellar ataxia type 2 and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

Finally, in Sweden, Karolinska Institute researchers report a method to force astrocytes to transmute into dopamine neurons, that work like normal midbrain dopamininergic neurons. The finding, could be the first step in an alternate therapeutic approach for Parkinsons disease.

Image: DARPA

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This Week in Neuroscience News 4/16/17 - ReliaWire

Physiology

New physiology major announced for fall 2017 – The Aquinas

Annie Kennedy Staff Writer

The University is introducing a new major in physiology in the fall of 2017. The major, housed in the biology department, is open to current and incoming first-year students.

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons A NEW physiology major will be available for students at The University for the upcoming fall semester.

The major is also open to current exercise science first-year students. Because they take anatomy and physiology as first-year students, they will take general biology I and II in their sophomore year.

Students have already switched to the major. Stephanie Nativo, a first-year student, switched to the major to prepare herself to become a physicians assistant.

I feel great knowing that I am one of the first students to graduate with this major and hope that it will inspire more students to follow their passions, she said.

Terrence E. Sweeney, Ph.D., is the program director, chair of the biology department and the person who brought the major to The University. He first proposed the physiology major in June 2015, and then he introduced it to the department in the fall 2015 semester. Last month, the new major was approved by the department, the dean and the faculty senate. Additional faculty whohelped develop the major include Gary Kwiecinski, Ph.D., Matthew Socha, Ph.D., Maria Squire, Ph.D. and Robert Waldek, Ph.D.

Sweeney explained that there are not many schools in the Northeast that offer a physiology major. He believes that this new major will help draw students to The Universitywho may not have considered this school in the first place.

An article by Erik J. Henriksen, Ph.D., published in the review journal Physiology, discussed the growth of physiology majors at other universities in the country.

The growth of these physiology programs has far exceeded the increases observed in overall undergraduate enrollments at these institutions, Henriksen wrote.

Students who are not interested or who cannot switch their major to physiology can still take general physiology because the department plans to continue to offer many sections of this popular course. For those who are concerned that this major is too focused on physiology and will not provide enough of a background in biology, Sweeney explained that they have addressed this concern in two ways.

First, physiology majors will take general biology as first-year students, which will provide them with a broad background in all of biology. Second, they will be encouraged to take a broad variety of electives in their junior and senior years. Additionally, Sweeney noted that students who do not want this specificity will be encouraged to consider the biology major because the physiology major is designed for students who want a more specific approach to this field.

Students in the major begin their college career the same way as many other science majors: by taking general biology and general chemistry courses. In their sophomore year, students take advanced human anatomy and physiology I and II, and in their junior year, they take cellular and integrative physiology with lab. Additionally, in their junior year, students take a seminar designed to introduce students to the latest techniques used in physiology research. Finally, in the spring of their junior year and in their senior year, students take 12 credits of physiology electives in three domains: molecular and cellular physiology, systems physiology and comparative physiology.

If anyone has any questions about this major, he or she is encouraged to contact Sweeney at terrence.sweeney@scranton.edu.

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New physiology major announced for fall 2017 - The Aquinas

Neuroscience

The Landscape of Neuroscience 2006 – 2015 – Discover Magazine (blog)

How has neuroscience changed over the past decade? In a new paper, Hong Kong researchers Andy Wai Kan Yeung and colleagues take a look at brain science using the tools of citation analysis.

Yeung et al. extracted data from 2006-2015 from Web of Science and Journal Citation Reports (JCR), which track publications and citations. All journals that the JCR classifies in the Neurosciences category were included.

The first change Yeung et al. noticed was that the number of published neuroscience papers has been growing steadily, although keep in mind that the increasing volume of papers is a phenomenon not limited to neuroscience.

Looking at which kinds of papers received the most citations, Yeung et al. noticed a shift towards the more psychological and behavioural side of brain science. The Web of Science Psychology category went from #6 in terms of citations in 2006 up to #1 in 2015, while Behavioral sciences went from #3 to #2. The more biological areas of neuroscience, such as Physiology and Biochemistry, molecular biology, declined in terms of citations. A sign of the times?

A breakdown of papers by the national affiliations of the authors reveals the growth of Chinese neuroscience over the 2006 to 2015 period. While just 3% of papers had at least one author based in China in 2006, by 2015 this had risen to over 11%. China has overtaken Germany, the UK, Japan, and other countries such that China is now #2 on the world neuroscience authorship list.

Finally, Yeung et al. tracked the impact factor (average citations per paper) of ten core neuroscience journals over time. This reveals little change from 2006 to 2015 although the venerable Journal of Neuroscience (established 1981) has lost some ground to Neuroimage (founded 1992).

Overall, this is an interesting little paper. The results dont contain any big surprises, but its nice to be able to see where neuroscience is going.

Yeung AW, Goto TK, & Leung WK (2017). The Changing Landscape of Neuroscience Research, 2006-2015: A Bibliometric Study. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 11 PMID: 28377687

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The Landscape of Neuroscience 2006 - 2015 - Discover Magazine (blog)