Category Archives: Neuroscience

PMR : Detailed Examination Of The Neuroscience Market Will Reach US$ 520 Mn By 2025 – Cole of Duty

With healthy CAGR of 6.4%, theglobalneuroscience marketis likely to grow from US$ 301.6 Mn in 2016 to US$ 520.8 Mn by 2025 end. This growth is mainly fuelled by advancement in neuroimaging and increasing R & D in neuroinformatics. Neuroscience Market: Global Industry Analysis (2012-2016)and Forecast (2017-2025),is the new publication of Persistence Market Research that focuses on merger and acquisition, strategic collaborations and technology, and technology transfer agreements, which play a vital role in the global neuroscience market.

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Sales Revenue:Market Share, Growth Rate, Current Market Analysis.Product Revenue for Top Players: Market Share, Growth Rate, Current Market Situation Analysis.Industry Trends: United States and Other Regions Revenue, Status and Outlook.Market Segment: By Types, By Applications, By Regions/ Geography.Market Environment: Government Policies, Technological Changes, Market Risks.Market Drivers: Growing Demand, Reduction in Cost, Market Opportunities and Challenges.Competitive Landscape: By Manufacturers, Development Trends, Marketing Area

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North America and Europe are expected to dominate the global neuroscience market in the assessed period of 8-years that is between 2017 and 2025.

Global Neuroscience Market: Relevance and Impact of Factors

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Global Neuroscience Market: Forecast by Component Type

On the basis of component type, the global neuroscience market is segmented into instrument, software and services. Instrument segmented is sub-segmented into MRI imaging systems and neuromicroscopy, while services segmented divided into consulting services, installation services and maintenance services.

Instrument segment dominated the global neuroscience market in revenue terms in 2016 and is projected to continue to do so throughout the forecast period. Instrument segment is the most attractive segment, with attractiveness index of 2.6 over the forecast period.

Instrument segment was valued atUS$ 221.6 Mnin 2016 and is projected to be valued atUS$ 408.1 Mn in 2025growing at aCAGR of 7.2%during the forecast period. This segment is expected to accounts for high revenue contribution to the global neuroscience market as compared to software and services segments over the forecast period.

Software segment is expected to be the second most lucrative segment in the global neuroscience market, with attractiveness index of0.3 duringthe forecast period. This segment was accounted for 15.4% value share in 2017 which is expected to drop down to 12.9 % revenue share in 2025.

Global Neuroscience Market: Forecast by End User

On the basis of end user, global neuroscience market is segmented into hospitals, diagnostic laboratories, research institutes, and academic institutes.

Diagnostics laboratory segment is expected to be the second most lucrative segment in the global neuroscience market by 2025 end. However, in terms of CAGR and revenue share, hospitals segment is expected to lead he market throughout the estimated period. In 2025, hospital segment is likely to grab 40.2% market share in 2025, expanding at a robustCAGR of 7.3%during the estimated period.

Research institutes segment is expected to be the least attractive segment in the global neuroscience market, with attractiveness index of 0.7 during the forecast period.

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Proton Therapy Systems Market

Proton Therapy Market Segmented By Single Room, Multiple Room Set up Type with Head and Neck Cancer, Brain Cancer, Sarcoma Pediatric Cancer, Gastro-intestinal Cancer, Prostate Cancer, Lung Cancer Indication.For More Information

Trauma Fixation Devices Marketglobal trauma fixation devices market is estimated to represent more than US$ 450 Mn of the total market in 2017 and is estimated to reach little more than US$ 800 Mn by 2025 end, expanding at CAGR of 7.5% over the forecast period of 20172025.For More Information

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PMR : Detailed Examination Of The Neuroscience Market Will Reach US$ 520 Mn By 2025 - Cole of Duty

Save 75% one the FitMind Neuroscience-Based Meditation App – Geeky Gadgets

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The neuroscience of stress – Trinidad News

FeaturesRachael Espinet2 Days AgoKheston Walkins is the owner of Allegory, a neuro-innovation company that uses neuroscience to teach people how to regulate their moods. -

GLOBALLY, mental health experts are bracing themselves for a mental health fallout from the covid19 public health crisis.

Some people are anxious about catching the disease, while others worry about their finances.

As people in TT are confined to their homes, some peoples rates of stress have gone up while for others the stressors of everyday life have been removed.

People living in hostile homes, who lost their income or are living with trauma may be experiencing intensified stress.

Others whose basic needs such as food, shelter and livelihood are fulfilled are probably enjoying the slowdown. People are learning to bake, are spending time with their families and seeking out those they love while they are stuck at home.

But that slowdown cannot last forever, and stress will again creep back into their lives when the country gets busy again.

On May 6, Health Minister Terrence Deyalsingh spoke about the impending psychological aftermath of the stay-at-home measures. The ministry is working on a countrywide attempt to treat with the mental health needs of citizens.

Newsday presents a two-part series on the science of stress the biology of stress and how someone can recognise signs of stress to help them manage their mood.

On May 1 Newsday spoke to Kheston Walkins, owner of Allegory, a neuro-innovation company that uses neuroscience to teach people how to regulate their moods.

Stress is tension, pressure or strain in the body. It is the bodys reaction to external stimuli, such as sitting at a desk for too long, a fight with a loved one, staring at screens or any perception of danger.

Stress is the limbic systems way of communicating something is wrongand needs to be rectified. The limbic system is the part of the brain responsible for emotions and memory. The amygdala is responsible for the fight, flight or freeze response.

The human brain evolved to react in this way to signs of threats. When a body is stressed the heart and breathing rate increase.

In those conditions, the body releases stress hormones such as adrenalin, noradrenalin and cortisol. Adrenalin and noradrenalin are neurotransmitters that get the body ready to move in the fight, flight or freeze response. Adrenalin increases blood flow to muscles. Noradrenaline gets the body ready to react.

Cortisol is the stress hormone that tells the body it is no longer under threat and reaction can end.

The stress response hormone system provides an instant response to a threat but quickly returns to normal homoeostasis.

However, in chronically stressed people and people who are traumatised, their stress hormone system continues to secrete stress hormones long after the threat is gone.

Stress may seem benign, but many people have been living with stress for such a prolonged period that they arent aware that their moods are negatively altered because of the stress.

Stress can make you irritable, hostile or even violent.

Why do we have these physical responses to stress? Two hundred thousand years ago homo sapiens evolved in East Africa. The brain evolved over hundreds of thousands of years to deal with deadly threats that no longer exist.

Plover Avenue, Maloney Gardens, under water in October 2018. Flooding is an anticapted annual stress in TT during the rainy season. -

Think in a less civilised setting, and youre hunting an animal or there are wild animals around, you want to be able to have your heart rate increase, have your breathing rate increase because it oxygenates your blood and it sends more oxygen to your brain and the muscles you would need for running, Walkins said.

As there are fewer physical threats, people get stressed, the brain releases the same primal response from 200,000 years ago. The body will experience elevated heart and breathing rates but the energy created to fight off the threat often does not get consumed.

When you get scared, you run. In primary school, we hit a jep nest or the neighbours dog and you run. You run away, pant, and the endorphins start flowing to make the body feel good.

However, there are situations where people feel anxious, but there is no end, or consumption of energy, and that is problematic.

Eustress, distress, chronic stress and acute stress

Stress can be acute or chronic. If a person is surprised, that stress is acute and activates the stress response. Its not necessarily bad: there is eustress and distress.

Eustress is a positive and temporary stress that enables people to be more alert. If a person has an exam, that stress compels students to double-check their work. Or if youre walking in an unsafe area, youre more vigilant about the surroundings.

This stress can work well in the short term because cortisol increases memory retention. It accelerates the transformation of an experience from short- to long-term memory.

Darran Bonval of Plover Avenue, Maloney Gardens, shows the destruction in his home from floodwaters on October 2018. Flooding is an anticaped stress TT during the rainy season. -

This is a positive use of stress. But there is another stress that can be negative. Where you worry about things that (have a) low likelihood of happening, thats anxiety.

Nothings wrong with being anxious, but chronic anxiety is a problem.

Someone with chronic anxiety is also chronically stressed. Cortisol is secreted throughout the body over an extended period. Chronic stress for prolonged periods can cause negative effects in the prefrontal areas of the brain and places associated with memory.

This is one of the reasons why people who are high-stressed tend to be forgetful and they worry, and that in turn makes them more stressed, because they worry they are forgetting.

The triad of fulfilment or frustration: thoughts, feelings, actions.

When someone gets hungry, they are compelled to go get something to eat. If they dont get the food, they would then get angry or hangry hungry angry.

When a person is hangry, they are less tolerant of other people and are easily irritated. This is an emotional reaction to a biological need.

Most people think everything starts with a thought, but you could start with a feeling. If youre hungry, you could generate irritable thoughts. Youre not thinking youre hungry, youre thinking. This person is annoying.

The same is true when the body hasnt gotten enough sleep, is physically exhausted or if a woman has premenstrual syndrome (PMS).

You have a feeling. That can be connected to a thought, but if you dont have an action, it creates a loop of frustration. If youre anxious, you dont want to feel like that.

The body needs a release from the anxiety, otherwise it gets frustrated. The body does not want to be stressed, so a person is compelled to engage behaviour to mitigate the stress, such as walking away from the stressor, drinking alcohol or eating sweet or oily food. But these are cosmetic solutions and dont relieve the physiological stress response.

Not getting what you need creates frustration. Theres maladaptive behaviour that can result.

This may be substance abuse and violence, which Walkins describes as maladaptive behaviour because it does not benefit the organism.

But it happens. In children, you see them lash out because they cant get what they want, and they cant calm down. They dont know how.

And you see this with adults. When you say, Just calm down, that gets them more frustrated.

Telling someone to calm down invalidates how someone feels. If they cant control how they are feeling, it frustrates them further.

In part two of the Science of Stress, Walkins will discuss techniques he teaches his clients to deal with stress on Thursday.

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The neuroscience of stress - Trinidad News

To Succeed With Neuromarketing, What Do You Need to Know? – INSEAD Knowledge

Much of the classic market research advice applies to consumer neuroscience as well but the emerging field also features unique challenges.

Companies once viewed neuromarketing as a risky, perhaps overhyped proposition. But scepticism is now retreating in the face of mounting research evidence. A raft of recent studies confirm that, used properly, brain-scan technology (e.g. fMRI, EEG, fNRIS) is capable of revealing the reasons for consumers preferences, capturing their emotional reactions to ads and products, and (in some cases) predicting their behaviour, with greater accuracy than conventional focus groups and surveys.

The further development of the field will depend on marketers and companies adopting sensible internal standards for conducting neuromarketing research. Otherwise, there will be no reliable way to determine causation and therefore know whether and how to apply neuromarketing techniques within specific real-world marketing contexts.

It was encouraging to see, as part of an industry survey that we conducted for our recently published teaching note, that this is in fact a high priority for players in this space. We heard from many companies employing much more appropriate methods to verify neurometrics as compared to the past. To aid this evolution, we offer four suggestions for designing effective neuromarketing projects. Some of our advice would also apply to any type of market research project.

Step 1: Know what you want to know

A good neuromarketing study will be aimed at answering a few key questions, at most. More than that will require an excess of statistical comparisons that will bias your results and call for multiple comparison corrections.

The questions youre trying to answer must allow for concrete answers to emerge from neuromarketing analysis. For example: Do my online customers pay more attention to product photos or prices? or Should I use photos of satisfied customers or frolicking puppies on my website, in order to increase emotional engagement?

Notice that the above questions incorporate both a dependent variable the desired outcome, e.g. online sales or emotional engagement and an independent variable, or the thing that you hope will affect the dependent variable (in the above example, visual elements on a website). The questions also assume a hypothesised relationship between the variables, e.g. that diverting attention from prices to product photos will increase sales. Therefore, the purpose of the experiment will be to assess whether this presumed relationship holds true in reality. Results should be closely analysed with this in mind.

Step 2: Know what you want to do

Before you start collecting any data, youll want to prepare a detailed analysis plan. This will include:

In some industries, it is common practice to officially register and at least publish partial analysis plans (e.g. clinical trials in the pharmaceutical industry). Pre-registration can help prevent dubious interpretations of the results when they become public. Several online resources are available for this, such as the Open Science Framework or Aspredicted.org.

Step 3: Know what you have done

Neuromarketing studies are especially prone to technical glitches and random mischance, such as EEG sensors coming loose or excessive head motion distorting electromagnetic signals. To spot any mutant data before they influence results, it is crucial to visualise distributions before performing any data analysis.

You should also strategically violate study parameters to ensure the mechanisms are working as intended. For example, if you were measuring whether puppy photos or images of happy customers elicit more emotional engagement, you should intersperse some sad faces amidst the smiles. If the switch were not accompanied by a difference in the data, there would likely be something amiss with the collection or pre-processing of the data.

Step 4: Know whether you could do it again

When it comes to the replicability and reliability of your results, dont rely on assumptions. You should have a method for ascertaining the validity of your data-set. For example, one leading internet company splits its neurometric data in half. If the results are truly representative, the two halves should be statistically similar. With statistical software, you can bisect your data at random hundreds of times. Findings should be consistent no matter how you slice the numbers.

Another approach is to cross-validate the same question using several techniques. Confectionary manufacturer Ferreros Shopper Neuroscience department runs implicit association tests and in-store A/B testing to complement neuromarketing studies.

One more thing

Before launching their first foray into the field, companies should also familiarise themselves with the Neuromarketing Science & Business Association (NMSBA)s Code of Ethics for neuromarketing vendors. All NMSBA members are officially required to abide by the code, which covers, among other things, data privacy, participant consent and protocol transparency. The associations online directory lists nearly 80 member companies.

Companies anxious about choosing the right vendor should also heed neuroscience researcher Joe Devlins five warning signs of unscrupulous neuromarketing. In addition to keeping a finely calibrated B.S. detector, Devlin suggests being sceptical of companies making overly simplistic claims about how the human brain works, touting secret sauce analytical techniques or offering a single solution for every problem.

For further information, we invite you to download our recently published teaching note designed to introduce professionals to the neuromarketing field.

Hilke Plassmann is the Octapharma Chaired Professor of Decision Neuroscience at INSEAD. She is a principal investigator at the Sorbonne Universitys Brain and Spine Institute (ICM), as well as the co-director of theBusiness Foundations Certificate(BFC) programme at INSEAD.

Aiqing Ling (INSEAD PhD) is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at University College Dublin.

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To Succeed With Neuromarketing, What Do You Need to Know? - INSEAD Knowledge

University at Buffalo’s John Paul Eberhard dies of COVID-19 compications – The Architect’s Newspaper

John Paul Eberhard, the founding dean of the University at Buffalo (UB) School of Architecture and Planning, died of coronavirus complications on Saturday, May 2, at the age of 93.

Eberhard led a long and colorful career. After serving in the marines during and after World War II and attending the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Eberhard formed a company with his friends, Creative Buildings, that was active through much of the 1950s, during which time Eberhard patented a design for a prefabricated chapel.

In 1957, he attended MIT as a Sloan Fellow, receiving a masters in industrial management. He then worked at Sheraton Hotel Corporation for a few years before working for the federal government in the Commerce Department, where he eventually became the director of the Institute for Applied Technology. In 1968, he moved to Buffalo after UB president Martin Meyerson tapped him to start the universitys new architecture school, which he ran until 1973.

Eberhard shaped an unconventional school, guided by ideas from general systems theory. He was very interested in the social systems that architecture was and is involved in. He envisioned a new role for architects where they coordinate interdisciplinary networks of engineers, politicians, and more. He was quoted on the cover of the May 8, 1969, issue of Engineering News-Record as saying Architects are obsolete.

After leaving Buffalo in 1973, Eberhard became president of the AIA Research Corporation, where he stayed until 1978. From 1981 to 1988 he was the executive director of the Building Research Board at the National Academy of Sciences and the National Research Council, after which he became head of the department of architecture at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, from 1989 to 1994. From 1995 to 1999, he served as the director of discovery at the American Architectural Foundation, where Eberhard became interested in the use of neuroscience for spatial design, and in 2003, he founded the Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture.

He is survived by four children, as well as step-grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

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University at Buffalo's John Paul Eberhard dies of COVID-19 compications - The Architect's Newspaper

Internet-delivered CBT just as effective as face-to-face treatment for health anxiety – News-Medical.Net

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.May 13 2020

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have compared two ways of delivering cognitive behavioral therapy, CBT, to treat people with health anxiety, a condition that may increase in the wake of COVID-19. Out of about 200 study participants, half received CBT over the Internet and half were treated with conventional face-to-face CBT. The results, published in JAMA Psychiatry, show that Internet-delivered treatment had comparable effects, and could serve as an alternative to physical meetings in helping people who are worried about their health.

The study is unique in that it is the first direct comparison of face-to-face CBT and Internet-delivered CBT for health anxiety. The results show that a treatment delivered exclusively online is sufficient to achieve tough and required behavioral changes. This is especially relevant now when the coronavirus pandemic limits our opportunities for physical meetings, while the fear of being affected by a severe health condition is discussed more frequently."

Erik Hedman-Lagerlf, professor of psychology and researcher at the Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet

Health anxiety, also referred to as hypochondriasis, is characterized by an excessive and persistent fear or worry about serious illness. It often leads to significant suffering and functional impairment. , About 3.5 percent of the general population and up to 20 percent of patients in medical clinics are estimated to suffer from the condition, which causes great strain on the health care system.

In face-to-face CBT, which typically involves weekly sessions with a mental health clinician, about two thirds of patients respond to treatment. However, given the prevalence of health anxiety and scarcity of mental health professionals, the need for treatment far exceeds the availability of evidence-based face-to-face therapy. The researchers therefore wanted to examine the effect of an Internet-based treatment where the patient has access to information online and communicates regularly with a therapist through an email-like system. The patient also engages in behavioral changes in their day-to-day life, just as in the case of face-to-face CBT.

In the study, 204 adults with health anxiety were randomized to receive either face-to-face or Internet CBT for a period of 12 weeks. The participants were asked to rate their level of health anxiety each week using a standardized questionnaire commonly referred to as the Health Anxiety Inventory.

According to the researchers, Internet CBT had effects largely on par with the face-to-face treatment. This was despite the fact that the average Internet-therapist spent only 10 minutes per patient per week compared with about 45 minutes in the other group.

"One significant advantage is that the therapist can help more patients in the same time, but also that the treatment can be delivered regardless of the patient's geographical location, including to people living in rural areas," says Erland Axelsson, psychologist and researcher at the Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet. "The fact that you can access the content and communicate with your therapist at any time of the day also means that people who struggle to take time off from work can take part in treatment."

Another positive aspect of online CBT is that patients who are reluctant to seek psychological treatment due to perceived stigma may be more inclined to seek help, Erland Axelsson adds.

The study was conducted from 2014 to 2020 as a collaboration between Gustavsberg's primary care clinic and Karolinska Institutet. This research was financed by Karolinska Institutet, Region Stockholm, and Psykiatrifonden. Some of the authors have reported conflicts of interest including the co-authorship of a self-help book for health anxiety and shareholdings in a company specializing in online psychiatric symptom assessment.

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Internet-delivered CBT just as effective as face-to-face treatment for health anxiety - News-Medical.Net

Effects of internet CBT for health anxiety on par with face-to-face treatment – Science Codex

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have compared two ways of delivering cognitive behavioral therapy, CBT, to treat people with health anxiety, a condition that may increase in the wake of COVID-19. Out of about 200 study participants, half received CBT over the Internet and half were treated with conventional face-to-face CBT. The results, published in JAMA Psychiatry, show that Internet-delivered treatment had comparable effects, and could serve as an alternative to physical meetings in helping people who are worried about their health.

"The study is unique in that it is the first direct comparison of face-to-face CBT and Internet-delivered CBT for health anxiety," says Erik Hedman-Lagerlf, professor of psychology and researcher at the Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet. "The results show that a treatment delivered exclusively online is sufficient to achieve tough and required behavioral changes. This is especially relevant now when the coronavirus pandemic limits our opportunities for physical meetings, while the fear of being affected by a severe health condition is discussed more frequently."

Health anxiety, also referred to as hypochondriasis, is characterized by an excessive and persistent fear or worry about serious illness. It often leads to significant suffering and functional impairment. , About 3.5 percent of the general population and up to 20 percent of patients in medical clinics are estimated to suffer from the condition, which causes great strain on the health care system.

In face-to-face CBT, which typically involves weekly sessions with a mental health clinician, about two thirds of patients respond to treatment. However, given the prevalence of health anxiety and scarcity of mental health professionals, the need for treatment far exceeds the availability of evidence-based face-to-face therapy. The researchers therefore wanted to examine the effect of an Internet-based treatment where the patient has access to information online and communicates regularly with a therapist through an email-like system. The patient also engages in behavioral changes in their day-to-day life, just as in the case of face-to-face CBT.

In the study, 204 adults with health anxiety were randomized to receive either face-to-face or Internet CBT for a period of 12 weeks. The participants were asked to rate their level of health anxiety each week using a standardized questionnaire commonly referred to as the Health Anxiety Inventory.

According to the researchers, Internet CBT had effects largely on par with the face-to-face treatment. This was despite the fact that the average Internet-therapist spent only 10 minutes per patient per week compared with about 45 minutes in the other group.

"One significant advantage is that the therapist can help more patients in the same time, but also that the treatment can be delivered regardless of the patient's geographical location, including to people living in rural areas," says Erland Axelsson, psychologist and researcher at the Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet. "The fact that you can access the content and communicate with your therapist at any time of the day also means that people who struggle to take time off from work can take part in treatment."

Another positive aspect of online CBT is that patients who are reluctant to seek psychological treatment due to perceived stigma may be more inclined to seek help, Erland Axelsson adds.

The study was conducted from 2014 to 2020 as a collaboration between Gustavsberg's primary care clinic and Karolinska Institutet. This research was financed by Karolinska Institutet, Region Stockholm, and Psykiatrifonden. Some of the authors have reported conflicts of interest including the co-authorship of a self-help book for health anxiety and shareholdings in a company specializing in online psychiatric symptom assessment.

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Effects of internet CBT for health anxiety on par with face-to-face treatment - Science Codex

Odor habituation is driven by important signal filtering process, shows study – News-Medical.net

"Imagine a dog playing in a garden and smelling all of these different flowery smells, and then somewhere in the distance a predator appears, like a fox. The raw input coming into the dog's nose is a smell that consists of something like 90% flowers and only five or 10% of this predator," CSHL Associate Professor Saket Navlakha explained.

"The question that we sought out to study here is, 'how does this dog suppress this uninformative signal of all these flowers... and amplify the significant part, which is the predator, so that it then reacts appropriately?"

Dogs have complex brains, so researchers at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) turned to fruit flies to figure it out. How does the simple fly brain learn to ignore prevalent odors to focus on newer but rarer odorants? These findings may apply to dogs or humans, and could be used to train artificially intelligent machines.

In the May 11 issue of the scientific journal PNAS, postdoctoral researcher Yang Shen and Navlakha outline how this surprisingly complex neural task, called odor habituation, happens in the fly brain and can be translated into computer code.

According to Shen, fruit flies are frequently in situations where their tiny brains need to distinguish between many many 'usual' smells and something potentially more important.

A fruit fly "has about 100,000 neurons in its brain and the actual connectivity of many of these neurons has now been mapped out," Navlakha added.

This allows us to understand what are the mechanisms that the brain uses to solve this habituation problem from an algorithmic perspective. So that became the launching point for this project."

Saket Navlakha, Associate Professor, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory

The researchers found that odor habituation is driven by an important signal filtering process. When a fly detects an odor, a few select neurons (called Kenyon cells) respond to it. The pattern of firing in these responding neurons make up what's called the "tag" for the odor.

If an odor is constantly present but conveys no urgent information to the fly, the neurons that make up the odor's tag will start to decrease their activity over time.

This is the brain habituating to a background smell. An odor tag with fewer active neurons is less likely to elicit a response in an organism than an odor with lots of neuron activity. As a result, smells that are around all the time can be ignored in favor of a new odor that is faint but important.

A fly brain suppresses responses to repeated odors, but the process can also be reversed if the odor becomes more rare or more important to the fly.

"By framing this computationally, we can better our understanding of the whole process of how signals are being processed in the brain," Shen said.

Navlakha is on a mission to bridge the divide between computational research and neuroscience.

"One of the goals of this entire research direction is to try and understand the brain as a kind of library of algorithms that has been evolved to solve basic information processing problems," he said. "This odor habituation process is something that has not been extensively used in, for example, robotics applications where you have a lot of streaming data and you want to filter unnecessary data."

"It wasn't our goal to say that this algorithm from neuroscience is better than anything else that anyone has developed," he added, "but it has been an opportunity to understand how biology solves this problem and how habituation affects our ability to perceive and discriminate odors."

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Odor habituation is driven by important signal filtering process, shows study - News-Medical.net

Discovery of How the Brain Links Memories Could Offer Route to Trauma Therapies – Technology Networks

A woman walking down the street hears a bang. Several moments later she discovers her boyfriend, who had been walking ahead of her, has been shot. A month later, the woman checks into the emergency room. The noises made by garbage trucks, she says, are causing panic attacks. Her brain had formed a deep, lasting connection between loud sounds and the devastating sight she witnessed.This story, relayed by clinical psychiatrist and co-author of a new study Mohsin Ahmed, MD, PhD, is a powerful example of the brain's powerful ability to remember and connect events separated in time. And now, in that new study in mice published in Neuron,scientists at Columbia's Zuckerman Institute have shed light on how the brain can form such enduring links.

The scientists uncovered a surprising mechanism by which the hippocampus, a brain region critical for memory, builds bridges across time: by firing off bursts of activity that seem random, but in fact make up a complex pattern that, over time, help the brain learn associations. By revealing the underlying circuitry behind associative learning, the findings lay the foundation for a better understanding of anxiety and trauma- and stressor-related disorders, such as panic and post-traumatic stress disorders, in which a seemingly neutral event can elicit a negative response.

"We know that the hippocampus is important in forms of learning that involve linking two events that happen even up to 10 to 30 seconds apart," said Attila Losonczy, MD, PhD, a principal investigator at Columbia's Mortimer B. Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute and the paper's co-senior author. "This ability is a key to survival, but the mechanisms behind it have proven elusive. With today's study in mice, we have mapped the complex calculations the brain undertakes in order to link distinct events that are separated in time."

The hippocampus a small, seahorse-shaped region buried deep in the brain is an important headquarters for learning and memory. Previous experiments in mice showed that disruption to the hippocampus leaves the animals with trouble learning to associate two events separated by tens of seconds.

"The prevailing view has been that cells in the hippocampus keep up a level of persistent activity to associate such events," said Dr. Ahmed, an assistant professor of clinical psychiatry at Columbia's Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, and co-first author of today's study. "Turning these cells off would thus disrupt learning."

To test this traditional view, the researchers imaged parts of the hippocampus of mice as the animals were exposed to two different stimuli: a neutral sound followed by a small but unpleasant puff of air. A fifteen-second delay separated the two events. The scientists repeated this experiment across several trials. Over time, the mice learned to associate the tone with the soon-to-follow puff of air. Using advanced two-photon microscopy and functional calcium imaging, they recorded the activity of thousands of neurons, a type of brain cell, in the animals' hippocampus simultaneously over the course of each trial for many days.

"With this approach, we could mimic, albeit in a simpler way, the process our own brains undergo when we learn to connect two events," said Dr. Losonczy, who is also a professor of neuroscience at Columbia's Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons.

To make sense of the information they collected, the researchers teamed up with computational neuroscientists who develop powerful mathematical tools to analyze vast amounts of experimental data.

"We expected to see repetitive, continuous neural activity that persisted during the fifteen-second gap, an indication of the hippocampus at work linking the auditory tone and the air puff," said computational neuroscientist Stefano Fusi, PhD, a principal investigator at Columbia's Zuckerman Institute and the paper's co-senior author. "But when we began to analyze the data, we saw no such activity."

Instead, the neural activity recorded during the fifteen-second time gap was sparse. Only a small number of neurons fired, and they did so seemingly at random. This sporadic activity looked distinctly different from the continuous activity that the brain displays during other learning and memory tasks, like memorizing a phone number.

"The activity appears to come in fits and bursts at intermittent and random time periods throughout the task," said James Priestley, a doctoral candidate co-mentored by Drs. Losonczy and Fusi at Columbia's Zuckerman Institute and the paper's co-first author. "To understand activity, we had to shift the way we analyzed data and use tools designed to make sense of random processes."

Ultimately, the researchers discovered a pattern in the randomness: a style of mental computing that seems to be a remarkably efficient way that neurons store information. Instead of communicating with each other constantly, the neurons save energy perhaps by encoding information in the connections between cells, called synapses, rather than through the electrical activity of the cells.

"We were happy to see that the brain doesn't maintain ongoing activity over all these seconds because, metabolically, that's not the most efficient way to store information," said Dr. Fusi, who is also a professor of neuroscience at Columbia's Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons. "The brain seems to have a more efficient way to build this bridge, which we suspect may involve changing the strength of the synapses."

In addition to helping to map the circuitry involved in associative learning, these findings also provide a starting point to more deeply explore disorders involving dysfunctions in associative memory, such as panic and post-traumatic stress disorder.

"While our study does not explicitly model the clinical syndromes of either of these disorders, it can be immensely informative," said Dr. Ahmed, who is also a member of the Losonczy lab at Columbia's Zuckerman Institute. "For example, it can help us to model some aspects of what may be happening in the brain when patients experience a fearful association between two events that would, to someone else, not elicit fright or panic."ReferenceAhmed et al. (2020). Hippocampal Network Reorganization Underlies the Formation of a Temporal Association Memory. Neuron. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2020.04.013

This article has been republished from the following materials. Note: material may have been edited for length and content. For further information, please contact the cited source.

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Ironshore to Present Posters at the 2020 Neuroscience Education Institute Virtual Scientific Poster Session – Business Wire

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Ironshore Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Ironshore), a wholly owned subsidiary of Highland Therapeutics Inc. and a leader in the commercialization of novel treatments for Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), today announced it is presenting two posters featuring new analyses of its novel delayed-release and extended-release methylphenidate formulation. These analyses demonstrate that the uniphasic drug delivery system and site of absorption produce a gradual absorption and protracted elimination phase resulting in attenuated peak drug concentration levels across the dosing range and may lead to a dose-dependent duration of effect. The posters are available for download at the Virtual Scientific Poster Session of the Neuroscience Education Institute (NEI). This initiative was coordinated in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and is designed to fill the void in the presentation and dissemination of emerging science historically presented during live meetings. The posters will be accessible to NEIs 65,700 members and subscribers at http://nei.global/vsp.

The two poster presentations are:

Model-Based Approach to Establish Predicted Clinical Response of Delayed-Release and Extended-Release Methylphenidate (DR/ER-MPH) for ADHD TreatmentRoberto Gomeni, PhD, Marina Komolova, PhD; Bev Incledon, PhD; Stephen V. Faraone, PhDhttps://www.neiglobal.com/VSP/NEIVSPDetail/tabid/562/args/7/Default.aspx

Site-Specific Colonic Absorption for an Optimized Pharmacokinetic Profile of DR/ER-MPH for the Treatment of ADHDFeng Zhang, PhD; Norberto J. DeSousa, MA; F. Randy Sallee, MD, PhD; David Lickrish; Bev Incledon, PhDhttps://www.neiglobal.com/VSP/NEIVSPDetail/tabid/562/args/6/Default.aspx

The posters will enable NEIs stakeholders to learn more about JORNAY PM (methylphenidate HCl) extended-release capsules CII, which was approved in August 2018 by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the treatment of ADHD in patients 6 years and older.

Ironshore is proud to participate in NEIs innovative new forum to present data that are relevant to psychiatrists, psychiatric nurse practitioners, and other mental health care professionals, said Dr. Randy Sallee, Ironshores Chief Medical Officer. We look forward to sharing new data related to the unique absorption profile of JORNAY PM facilitated by the DELEXIS delayed-release, extended-release, drug delivery technology as well as an evaluation of the medicines pharmacokinetic profile, after single 20mg and 100mg doses, in relation to that of other FDA-approved stimulant medications.

Dr. Bev Incledon, EVP, Research & Development for Ironshore Pharmaceuticals & Development, Inc. added, Head-to-head studies assessing safety and efficacy of Jornay PM and other stimulants have not been conducted and Jornay PM is not substitutable with other methylphenidate products on a milligram per milligram basis. In this analysis, a 100-mg dose of JORNAY PM produces a maximum serum methylphenidate concentration that is either equal to or lower than that of 54mg and 60mg of other methylphenidate products. While this may surprise some healthcare professionals, this result is directly attributable to the site of absorption for Jornay PM, the colon, which has vastly different absorption qualities relative to the stomach and upper intestine. Although the Cmax was proportionately lower than expected, the absorption window was significantly longer. Together, this resulted in 74% bioavailability relative to a Ritalin IR comparator.

JORNAY PM is the first and only stimulant medication that is dosed in the evening and has demonstrated improved ADHD symptom control in the early morning, throughout the day and during the evening time period in two pivotal Phase 3 trials.

WARNING: ABUSE AND DEPENDENCE

See full prescribing information for complete boxed warning.

See additional important safety information below.

JORNAY PM is the first product to leverage the novel DELEXIS delayed-release and extended-release drug delivery technology that contains two functional film coatings. The first layer delays the initial release of drug for up to 10 hours while the second layer helps to control the rate of release of the active pharmaceutical ingredient from the time the patient awakens the next morning, throughout the day and into the evening.

About ADHDADHD is among the most common childhood psychiatric conditions with behavioral symptoms fluctuating throughout the day. It is usually first diagnosed in childhood and often lasts into adulthood. Children with ADHD may have trouble paying attention, controlling impulsive behaviors, or be overly active. Many home-based difficulties for children and adolescents with ADHD occur during the early morning routine (i.e., before the school day begins).

About JORNAY PMDeveloped by Ironshore Pharmaceuticals & Development, Inc., JORNAY PM is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant prescription medicine used for the treatment of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in people six years of age and older. JORNAY PM may help increase attention and decrease impulsiveness and hyperactivity in people six years of age and older with ADHD. It is not known if JORNAY PM is safe and effective in children under six years of age.

JORNAY PM is dosed once daily in the evening and should be initiated at 8:00 p.m. Timing of administration of JORNAY PM may be adjusted between 6:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. to optimize the tolerability and the efficacy the next morning and throughout the day. The recommended starting dose for patients 6 years and older is 20 mg once daily in the evening. Dosage may be titrated weekly in increments of 20 mg per day up to maximum daily dose of 100 mg. The mean optimized dose required to improve symptoms from the time the patient wakes up, throughout the day and into the evening in children 6-12 years old was 67 mg in Study 1 and 68.1 mg in Study 2. The relative bioavailability of JORNAY PM (given once a day) compared to the same daily dose of a methylphenidate immediate-release oral product (given 3 times a day) in adults is approximately 74%. JORNAY PM is primarily absorbed in the colon which may contribute to the reduced bioavailability of the drug. JORNAY PM is not interchangeable on a milligram-per-milligram basis with other methylphenidate formulations.

Please see additional dosing information in the full prescribing information for JORNAY PM at http://ironshorepharma.com/labeling.pdf.

IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION

WARNING: ABUSE AND DEPENDENCECNS stimulants, including JORNAY PM, other methylphenidate-containing products, and amphetamines, have a high potential for abuse and dependence. Assess the risk of abuse prior to prescribing and monitor for signs of abuse and dependence while on therapy.

CONTRAINDICATIONS

WARNINGS AND PRECAUTIONS

ADVERSE REACTIONS

PREGNANCY AND LACTATION

Please visit http://ironshorepharma.com/labeling.pdf for additional important safety information and the Full Prescribing Information, including Boxed Warning, for JORNAY PM.

About Ironshore Pharmaceuticals Inc.Ironshore Pharmaceuticals Inc. commercializes innovative, patient-centric treatment options to improve the lives of patients and caregivers. Based in North Carolina, Ironshore Pharmaceuticals Inc. is responsible for the sales, marketing and distribution of pharmaceutical products within the US. Ironshore Pharmaceuticals Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Highland Therapeutics Inc. based in Toronto, Canada.

About Ironshore Pharmaceuticals & Development, Inc.Ironshore Pharmaceuticals & Development, Inc., based in Grand Cayman, develops novel therapeutics by leveraging its proprietary drug-delivery technology, DELEXIS. Ironshore Pharmaceuticals & Development, Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Highland Therapeutics Inc. based in Toronto, Canada.

Forward-Looking StatementsThis press release contains forward-looking information, which reflects Ironshores current expectations regarding future events. Forward-looking information is based on a number of assumptions and is subject to a number of risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond Ironshores control that could cause actual results and events to differ materially from those that are disclosed in or implied by such forward-looking information. These forward-looking statements are made as of the date of this press release and, except as expressly required by applicable law, Ironshore assumes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

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Ironshore to Present Posters at the 2020 Neuroscience Education Institute Virtual Scientific Poster Session - Business Wire