Poor sleep affects you over a lifetime

New research indicates that poor sleep not only affects you the next day, but over a lifetime.

A poor night's sleep can affect performance at work the next day, but over time, could disrupted sleep affect brain function in a permanent way? New evidence suggests it could.

A new study found that patients with issues like sleep apnea or heavy snoring developed problems with cognition around 10 years earlier than those without sleep-breathing troubles.

"Abnormal breathing patterns during sleep such as heavy snoring and sleep apnea are common in the elderly, affecting about 52 percent of men and 26 percent of women," explained the study's lead author, Ricardo S. Osorio, M.D., of the NYU School of Medicine in New York, in a press release.

In sleep apnea, breathing starts and stops repeatedly over the course of the night. Osorio and team wanted to see whether sleep apnea and other abnormal breathing patterns (called sleep-disordered breathing) were tied to cognitive issues.

To do so, these researchers looked at data from the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, which involved over 2,000 adults between the ages of 55 and 90. Some patients had no cognitive problems, while some developed Alzheimer's disease or mild cognitive impairment (MCI). In MCI, cognitive issues have developed beyond what is expected in normal aging but not far enough to be considered dementia.

Osorio and team found that patients who had sleep-disordered breathing started showing signs of cognitive problems an average of 10 years earlier than those who did not have issues with abnormal breathing patterns during sleep.

When looking only at patients with cognitive issues, those with sleep-disordered breathing started showing signs of MCI at an average age of 77. The same was true for those without the breathing troubles at an average age of 90.

In this group of patients, Alzheimer's disease was also seen earlier -- at an average age of 83 among those with sleep-disordered breathing, compared to an average age of 88 among those without breathing issues.

Osorio and team also looked at the effects of treating abnormal breathing patterns with continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP). CPAP delivers air pressure through a mask during sleep, helping to keep the airways open.

Treatment with CPAP seemed to reduce the risk of developing cognitive issues earlier, Osorio and colleagues found. Patients who used CPAP developed MCI at an average age of 82, compared to an average age of 72 among those who did not receive treatment for their sleep-disordered breathing.

"These findings were made in an observational study and as such, do not indicate a cause-and-effect relationship,” Osorio noted. “However, we are now focusing our research on CPAP treatment and memory and thinking decline over decades, as well as looking specifically at markers of brain cell death and deterioration.”

This study was published online April 15 in the journal Neurology.

Several study authors received industry support within the past two years and held patents involving procedures related to the study. A number of groups funded this research, such as the Foundation for Research in Sleep Disorders and the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative.

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Any physical activity benefits your brain

This study observes how any physical activity has positive benefits for adult brains. -JR

Everyone knows that exercise makes you feel more mentally alert at any age. But do you need to follow a specific training program to improve your cognitive function? Science has shown that the important thing is to just get moving. It's that simple. In fact, this was the finding of a study conducted at the Institut universitaire de gériatrie de Montréal (IUGM), an institution affiliated with Université de Montréal, by Dr. Nicolas Berryman, PhD, Exercise Physiologist, under the supervision of Dr. Louis Bherer, PhD, and Dr. Laurent Bosquet, PhD, that was published in the journal AGE (American Aging Association) in October.

The study compared the effects of different training methods on the cognitive functions of people aged 62 to 84 years. Two groups were assigned a high-intensity aerobic and strength-training program, whereas the third group performed tasks that targeted gross motor activities (coordination, balance, ball games, locomotive tasks, and flexibility). While the aerobics and strength-training were the only exercises that led to physical fitness improvements after 10 weeks (in terms of body composition, VO2 max, and maximum strength), all three groups showed equivalent improvement in cognitive performance.

The subjects in the third group performed activities that can easily be done at home, which is excellent news for sedentary people who can't see themselves suddenly going to a gym to work out. To improve your cognitive health, you can simply start by doing any activity you like.

"Our study targeted executive functions, or the functions that allow us to continue reacting effectively to a changing environment. We use these functions to plan, organize, develop strategies, pay attention to and remember details, and manage time and space," explained Dr. Louis Bherer, PhD.

"For a long time, it was believed that only aerobic exercise could improve executive functions. More recently, science has shown that strength-training also leads to positive results. Our new findings suggest that structured activities that aim to improve gross motor skills can also improve executive functions, which decline as we age. I would like seniors to remember that they have the power to improve their physical and cognitive health at any age and that they have many avenues to reach this goal," concluded Dr. Nicolas Berryman, PhD.

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Why does autism occur?

This article explains the factors that influence autism development, such as genetics, brain imaging, and cognition, and describes how they play into autism development.

An analysis of autism research covering genetics, brain imaging, and cognition led by Laurent Mottron of the University of Montreal has overhauled our understanding of why autism potentially occurs, develops and results in a diversity of symptoms. The team of senior academics involved in the project calls it the "Trigger-Threshold-Target'' model.

Brain plasticity refers to the brain's ability to respond and remodel itself, and this model is based on the idea that autism is a genetically induced plastic reaction. The trigger is multiple brain plasticity-enhancing genetic mutations that may or may not combine with a lowered genetic threshold for brain plasticity to produce either intellectual disability alone, autism, or autism without intellectual disability. The model confirms that the autistic brain develops with enhanced processing of certain types of information, which results in the brain searching for materials that possess the qualities it prefers and neglecting materials that don't. "One of the consequences of our new model will be to focus early childhood intervention on developing the particular strengths of the child's brain, rather than exclusively trying to correct missing behaviors, a practice that may be a waste of a once in a lifetime opportunity," Mottron said.

Mottron and his colleagues developed the model by examining the effect of mutations involved in autism together with the brain activity of autistic people as they undertake perceptual tasks. "Geneticists, using animals implanted with the mutations involved in autism, have found that most of them enhance synaptic plasticity -- the capacity of brain cells to create connections when new information is encountered. In parallel, our group and others have established that autism represents an altered balance between the processing of social and non-social information, i.e. the interest, performance and brain activity, in favor of non-social information," Mottron explained. "The Trigger-Threshold-Target model builds a bridge between these two series of facts, using the neuro cognitive effects of sensory deprivation to resolve the missing link between them."

The various superiorities that subgroups of autistic people present in perception or in language indicates that an autistic infant's brain adapts to the information it is given in a strikingly similar way to sensory-deprived people. A blind infant's brain compensate the lack of visual input by developing enhanced auditory processing abilities for example, and a deaf infant readapts to process visual inputs in a more refined fashion. Similarly, cognitive and brain imaging studies of autistic people work reveal enhanced activity, connectivity and structural modifications in the perceptive areas of the brain. Differences in the domain of information "targeted'' by these plastic processes are associated with the particular pattern of strengths and weaknesses of each autistic individual. "Speech and social impairment in some autistic toddlers may not be the result of a primary brain dysfunction of the mechanisms related to these abilities, but the result of their early neglect," Mottron said. "Our model suggests that the autistic superior perceptual processing compete with speech learning because neural resources are oriented towards the perceptual dimensions of language, neglecting its linguistic dimensions. Alternatively, for other subgroups of autistic people, known as Asperger, it's speech that's overdeveloped. In both cases, the overdeveloped function outcompetes social cognition for brain resources, resulting in a late development of social skills."

The model provides insight into the presence or absence of intellectual disability, which when causative mutation alter the function of brain cell networking. Rather than simply triggering a normal but enhanced plastic reaction, these mutations cause neurons to connect in a way that does not exist in non-autistic people. When brain cell networking functions normally, only the allocation of brain resources is changed.

As is the case with all children, environment and stimulation have an effect on the development and organization of an autistic child's brain. "Most early intervention programs adopt a restorative approach by working on aspects like social interest. However this focus may monopolize resources in favor of material that the child process with more difficulties, Mottron said. "We believe that early intervention for autistic children should take inspiration from the experience of congenitally deaf children, whose early exposure to sign language has a hugely positive effect on their language abilities. Interventions should therefore focus on identifying and harnessing the autistic child's strengths, like written language." By indicating that autistic ''restricted interests'' result from cerebral plasticity, this model suggest that they have an adaptive value and should therefore be the focus of intervention strategies for autism.

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Less sleep may mean faster brain aging for older adults

When older adults get less sleep, it may mean their brains age faster according to a recent study.

Researchers at Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School Singapore (Duke-NUS) have found evidence that the less older adults sleep, the faster their brains age. These findings, relevant in the context of Singapore's rapidly ageing society, pave the way for future work on sleep loss and its contribution to cognitive decline, including dementia.

Past research has examined the impact of sleep duration on cognitive functions in older adults. Though faster brain ventricle enlargement is a marker for cognitive decline and the development of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's, the effects of sleep on this marker have never been measured.

The Duke-NUS study examined the data of 66 older Chinese adults, from the Singapore-Longitudinal Aging Brain Study(1). Participants underwent structural MRI brain scans measuring brain volume and neuropsychological assessments testing cognitive function every two years. Additionally, their sleep duration was recorded through a questionnaire. Those who slept fewer hours showed evidence of faster ventricle enlargement and decline in cognitive performance.

"Our findings relate short sleep to a marker of brain aging," said Dr June Lo, the lead author and a Duke-NUS Research Fellow. "Work done elsewhere suggests that seven hours a day(2) for adults seems to be the sweet spot for optimal performance on computer based cognitive tests. In coming years we hope to determine what's good for cardio-metabolic and long term brain health too," added Professor Michael Chee, senior author and Director of the Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience at Duke-NUS.

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The placebo effect is relevant to sleep!

Researchers have shown that when people think they're getting more restorative sleep, they have better cognitive function.

A pair of researchers at Colorado College in College Springs, Colorado has shown that fooling people into believing they've had more or less than average amounts of REM sleep can impact their cognitive skill levels. In their paper published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, Christina Draganich and Kristi Erdal describe an experiment they conducted with volunteers that evaluated the relationship between the placebo effect regarding REM sleep and performance on cognitive skills test.

Prior research has shown that shorter time spent in REM sleep tends to impair cognitive skill levels after waking. Conversely, long REM sleep periods have been shown to improve such levels. In this new effort, the researchersset out to determine if the placebo effect might do the same.

To find out, the researchers enlisted the assistance of 164 students from the College and divided them into two groups. Individuals from both groups were asked to lie down and go to sleep while attached to a special machine that could measure the amount of time they were undergoing REM sleep (it actually didn't do anything at all). All participants were also given a seminar before sleeping where REM sleep was explained—they were also told what percentage of the time people normally spend in it while sleeping (on average 20 to 25 percent). It was also explained to them how REM duration had been found to impact cognitive skill levels. After sleeping, volunteers from one group were told they had spent more time than average in REM sleep, while those in the other group were told they'd spent less than the average amount of time in REM sleep. Individuals in both groups were also asked how they thought they had slept before being asked to take some tests that measured cognitive abilities (processing speeds and attention levels).

In analyzing the results, the researchers found that the people who were in the group who were told they'd spent more time in REM sleep did better than average on thecognitive tests while those who were told they got less, did worse—regardless of how well the volunteers thought they had slept.

The study shows, the researchers report, that the placebo effect can indeed by applied to REM sleep and cognitive skill levels, though they are at a loss as to why that is.

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Quitting smoking can help you with a good night's sleep

A recent study shows that quitting smoking has many health benefits, such as increasing her sleep quality.

As if cancer, heart disease and other diseases were not enough motivation to make quitting smoking your New Year's resolution, here's another wake-up call: New research published in the January 2014 issue of The FASEB Journal suggests that smoking disrupts the circadian clock function in both the lungs and the brain. Translation: Smoking ruins productive sleep, leading to cognitive dysfunction, mood disorders, depression and anxiety.

"This study has found a common pathway whereby cigarette smoke impacts both pulmonary and neurophysiological function. Further, the results suggest the possible therapeutic value of targeting this pathway with compounds that could improve both lung and brain functions in smokers," said Irfan Rahman, Ph.D., a researcher involved in the work from the Department of Environmental Medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center in Rochester, N.Y. "We envisage that our findings will be the basis for future developments in the treatment of those patients who are suffering with tobacco smoke-mediated injuries and diseases.

Rahman and colleagues found that tobacco smoke affects clock gene expression rhythms in the lung by producing parallel inflammation and depressed levels of brain locomotor activity. Short- and long- term smoking decreased a molecule known as SIRTUIN1 (SIRT1, an anti-aging molecule) and this reduction altered the level of the clock protein (BMAL1) in both lung and brain tissues in mice. A similar reduction was seen in lung tissue from human smokers and patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). They made this discovery using two groups of mice which were placed in smoking chambers for short-term and long-term tobacco inhalation. One of the groups was exposed to clean air only and the other was exposed to different numbers of cigarettes during the day. Researchers monitored their daily activity patterns and found that these mice were considerably less active following smoke exposure.

Scientists then used mice deficient in SIRT1 and found that tobacco smoke caused a dramatic decline in activity but this effect was attenuated in mice that over expressed this protein or were treated with a small pharmacological activator of the anti-aging protein. Further results suggest that the clock protein, BMAL1, was regulated by SIRT1, and the decrease in SIRT1 damaged BMAL1, resulting in a disturbance in the sleep cycle/molecular clock in mice and human smokers. However, this defect was restored by a small molecule activator of SIRT1.

"If you only stick to one New Year's resolution this year, make it quitting smoking," said Gerald Weissmann, M.D., Editor-in-Chief of The FASEB Journal. "Only Santa Claus has a list longer than that of the ailments caused or worsened by smoking. If you like having a good night's sleep, then that's just another reason to never smoke."

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Head impacts lead to lower test scores

A new study shows that non-concussion head impacts can result in lower test scores and brain changes over time.

Repeated blows to the head during a season of contact sports may cause changes in the brain's white matter and affect cognitive abilities even if none of the impacts resulted in a concussion, according to a study published today in the journalNeurology.

Using a form of magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI, researchers at the Indiana University School of Medicine and the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College found significant differences in brain white matter of varsity football and hockey players compared with a group of noncontact-sport athletes following one season of competition. White matter is composed primarily of axons, the long fibers that transmit signals between neurons.

"The contact sports and noncontact-sports groups differed, and the number of times the contact sports participants were hit, and the magnitude of the hits they sustained, were correlated with changes in the white matter measures," said Thomas W. McAllister, M.D., chair of the IU Department of Psychiatry.

"In addition, there was a group of contact sports athletes who didn't do as well as predicted on tests of learning and memory at the end of the season, and we found that the amount of change in the white matter measures was greater in this group," Dr. McAllister said.

The study was conducted while Dr. McAllister was Millennium Professor of Psychiatry at Dartmouth.

"This study raises the question of whether we should look not only at concussions but also the number of times athletes receive blows to the head and the magnitude of those blows, whether or not they are diagnosed with a concussion," Dr. McAllister said.

Two groups of Dartmouth athletes were studied: 80 football and ice hockey players in the contact sports group, and 79 athletes drawn from such noncontact sports as track, crew and Nordic skiing. The football and hockey players wore helmets equipped with accelerometers, which enabled the researchers to compile the number and severity of impacts to their heads. Players who sustained a concussion during the season were not included in the analysis.

The athletes were administered a form of MRI test known as diffusion tensor imaging, which is used to measure the integrity of the white matter. They were also given the California Verbal Learning Test II, a measure of verbal learning and memory.

The study did not find "large-scale, systematic differences" in the brain scan measures at the end of the season, which the authors found "somewhat reassuring" and consistent with the fact that thousands of individuals have played contact sports for many years without developing progressive neurodegenerative disorders.

However, the results do suggest that some athletes may be more susceptible to repeated head impacts that do not involve concussions, although much more research would be necessary to determine how to identify those athletes.

More work would also be necessary to determine whether the effects of the head impacts are long-lasting or permanent, and whether they are cumulative.

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What changes quality of life in a child with epilepsy? An action plan for families and neurologists.

This study looks at children recently diagnosed with epilepsy and determines their health-related quality of life which can be changed by medications, cognitive problems or behavior, parental depression and family demands.

The objectives of this study were to document trajectories of health–related quality of life (HRQL) and to identify predictors of the trajectory group in children with new–onset epilepsy. Results suggested that children with epilepsy are not homogenous but rather consist of groups with different trajectories and unique predictors of HRQL. Problems associated with child behavior and cognition were the strongest predictors identified. Given that several risk factors are modifiable, it is important to examine these as potential targets within a family–centered framework to improve HRQL of children with new–onset epilepsy.

Methods

• Data were obtained from the Health Related Quality of Life in Children with Epilepsy Study, a prospective multisite study of children 4–12 years old with new–onset epilepsy followed for 24 months.
• Health–related quality of life was measured using the Quality of Life in Childhood Epilepsy questionnaire.
• Trajectories of HRQL were investigated using latent class trajectory modeling.
• Multinomial logistic regression was used to identify child, parent, and family predictors of HRQL trajectories.

Results

• A total of 374 families responded at baseline and 283 (76%) completed the study.
• Five HRQL trajectories were observed: low–increasing (4%), moderate–decreasing (12%), moderate–increasing (22%), high–increasing (32%), and high–stable (30%).
• Many children in the low–increasing, moderate–increasing, high–increasing, and high–stable had clinically meaningful improvements in HRQL: 82%, 47%, 63%, and 44%, respectively.
• In contrast, the majority of children in the moderate–decreasing group (56%) experienced clinically meaningful declines in their HRQL.
• Factors predicting trajectories were number of antiepileptic drugs prescribed, presence of comorbid behavior or cognitive problems, parent depression, and family functioning and demands.

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Poverty in children and brain development - A Neuro-Thanksgiving Consideration

A Neuro-Thanksgiving Consideration

This study looks at a link between poverty during early childhood and impaired brain development. JR


Poverty in early childhood appears to be associated with smaller brain volumes measured through imaging at school age and early adolescence, according to a study published byJAMA Pediatrics, a JAMA Network publication.

Poverty is known to be associated with a higher risk of poor cognitive outcomes and school performance, according to the study background.

Joan Luby, M.D., of the Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, and colleagues investigated the effect of poverty on brain development by examining white and cortical gray matter, as well as hippocampus and amygdala volumes in a group of children ages 6 to 12 years who were followed since preschool. The 145 children were recruited from a larger group of children who participated in a preschool depression study.

The authors report that "exposure to poverty during early childhood is associated with smaller white mater, cortical gray matter, and hippocampal and amygdala volumes," the authors write.

Study findings also indicate that the effects of poverty on hippocampal volume were mediated (influenced) by caregiving and stressful life events.

"The finding that the effects of poverty on hippocampal development are mediated through caregiving and stressful life events further underscores the importance of high-quality early childhood caregiving, a task that can be achieved through parenting education and support, as well as through preschool programs that provide high-quality supplementary caregiving and safe haven to vulnerable young children," the study concludes. 

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Child's academic success affected by eating and sleeping habits

This article offers diet and sleep tips for children to ensure academic success.

Adults often hear what they should be doing to improve their health. But many of these known wellness behaviors are important for kids, too, and two University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) experts say school success depends on making the right choices.

Health habits, such as eating and sleep patterns, are linked to academic success, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Your brain can't work if you're not consuming enough calories, and in general that's not a problem," explained Krista Casazza, Ph.D., R.D., assistant professor in the Department of Nutrition Sciences. "But when kids go to school without eating breakfast, their cognitive function can be affected."

Casazza suggests kids start the day with fruits, proteins and whole grains. Avoid sugary cereals because they cause a sugar high, then a crash.

"A balanced breakfast will fuel the body for a long period and help sustain their attention level through lunch, when they need to eat well again," Casazza said. "This will hold them until dinner, and they won't snack ravenously after school."

If the kids do need to eat something prior to dinner, consider these options: • Offer healthy choices like yogurt, fruits and veggies. • If they want "kid stuff," baked chips can be an option, in moderation. • Drink water. Soda lacks nutritional value.

Once homework and dinner are done, sleep needs to be the priority.

"Children need a good night's sleep for their overall school performance," said Kristin Avis, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Pediatrics Division of Pulmonary and Sleep Medicine.

"Lack of sleep can lead to problems with attention and memory in the classroom, affect impulse control and mood regulation lead to anxiety and even depression," Avis said.

Avis said kids ages 6-12 should get nine hours sleep nightly as should adolescents ages 13-18 -- but typically they average little more than seven hours per night.

"Often parents think one night of sleep loss won't matter, but that's all it takes to affect them the next day," Avis explained. "If they are chronically deprived, it can snowball and make matters worse."

Catching up on lost sleep on the weekend can make matters worse.

"If kids sleep in Saturday, they have a hard time going to bed Saturday night; so they sleep in Sunday and have a hard time going to bed Sunday night," Avis said. "Monday morning they are tired, and it's hard to wake up for school. They struggle to get back on a good sleep schedule."

Avis recommends a consistent bedtime seven days a week.

"It keeps their clock set so they can go to bed at a certain time, sleep well through night and wake up well rested the next morning," Avis said.

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How Cognitive Performance is Affected by Heading a Soccer Ball

This article discusses the results of a study on the changed in cognitive tasks after high school female soccer players headed a soccer ball.

Sports-related head injuries are a growing concern, and new research suggests that even less forceful actions like 'heading' a soccer ball may cause changes in performance on certain cognitive tasks, according to a paper published February 27 in the open access journal PLOS ONEby Anne Sereno and colleagues from the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

The researchers tested the effects of non-injurious head-to-ball impacts on cognitive function using a tablet-based app. They found that high school female soccer players were significantly slower than non-players on a task that required pointing away from a target on the screen, but showed no difference in performance when pointing to the on-screen visual target.

According to the study, tasks that involve pointing away from a target require specific voluntary responses, whereas moving toward a target is a more reflexive response. Based on their observations, the authors conclude that sub-concussive blows to the head may cause changes specifically linked to certain cognitive functions.

The authors say that the app used in their research may be a quick and effective way to screen for and track cognitive changes in athletes. They add that a tablet-based application for such quick screens may also have broader applications in the clinic or the field.

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Cognitive Deficiencies Following Concussion Present After Two Months

This article discusses the cognitive effects of concussions which shows that the negative effects last at least two months.

The ability to focus and switch tasks readily amid distractions was compromised for up to two months following brain concussions suffered by high school athletes, according to a study at the University of Oregon.

Research team members, in an interview, said the discovery suggests that some athletes may need longer recovery periods than current practices dictate to lower the risk of subsequent concussions. Conventional wisdom, said lead author David Howell, a graduate student in the UO Department of Human Physiology, has typical recovery at seven to 10 days.

"The differences we detected may be a matter of milliseconds between a concussed person and a control subject, but as far as brain time goes that difference for a linebacker returning to competition too soon could mean the difference between another injury or successfully preparing to safely tackle an oncoming running back," Howell said.

The findings are based on cognitive exercises used five times over the two months with a pair of sensitive computer-based measuring tools -- the attentional network test and the task-switching test. The study focused on the effects of concussions to the frontal region of the brain, which is responsible for working, or short-term, memory and executive function, said Li-Shan Chou, professor of human physiology and director of the UO Motion Analysis Laboratory.

The study was published online ahead of print by Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, the official journal of the American College of Sports Medicine.

"If a person goes back to the playing field without a full recovery, that person is put into great danger of being re-injured," Chou said. "In any given season, if you suffer a concussion, the chances of your suffering a second one is three to six times higher and suffering a third is eight times higher. There are accumulations in this kind of injury. It doesn't go away easily."

A big unknown, the researchers said, is just how serious such injuries are for adolescents, whose brains are still developing. It could be the brain can recover more easily, or such injuries could continue to produce deficits that last a lifetime. "We just don't know," Chou said, adding that most previous studies have involved college-aged athletes and older adults.

Each year, there are 300,000 to 500,000 mild traumatic brain injury incidents, or concussions, with 100,000 tied to football, Chou said. He also cited a 2011 report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that called such injuries a silent epidemic, with sports-related concussions in youths rising by 60 percent in the last decade. Another source of concussions, he added, is improvised explosive devices used in warfare.

Through an arrangement with Eugene-area schools, 20 high school athletes who had suffered a concussion -- primarily football players but also others from soccer, volleyball and wrestling -- were assessed within 72 hours of injury and then again one week, two weeks, a month and two months later. Each of the subjects, whose diagnosis was made by a certified athletic trainer and/or physician, was matched with a healthy control subject of the same sex, body size, age and sport.

"After two months following the concussions, these individuals were still significantly impaired in their executive function, compared to age-matched, activity-matched and gender-matched control populations," said co-author Louis Osternig, professor emeritus of human physiology and a fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine.

Osternig, also a certified athletic trainer, noted that self-reports by the subjects about how they were feeling sometimes were at odds with test results, which continued to show subtle deficits in cognitive functioning. The researchers also noted anecdotal reports from concussed athletes and their parents of declines in academic performance during the two-month period.

Additional data linking the deficits found in cognitive testing to the subjects' gait -- their task-shifting abilities while walking -- currently are being analyzed in the ongoing project, which is funded by the Department of Defense Telemedicine & Advanced Technology Research Center (W81XWH-11-1-0717), National Athletic Trainers Association, Veterans Administration and a translational research award from a joint UO-PeaceHealth Oregon Region collaboration program.

"By using tools from cognitive psychology, neuroscience and human physiology, this interdisciplinary team of scientists is improving our understanding of how brain trauma affects reaction time, and they are helping to create better outcomes for athletes, soldiers and others who are affected by concussions," said Kimberly Andrews Espy, vice president for research and innovation and dean of the graduate school. "UO researchers are working to improve the health and well-being of people in our local communities and throughout the world."

"The brain is the controller of our body movement," Chou said. "If you have a brain injury, are there any differences that we can pick up in the way a subject moves the body? In this lab, we are using motion analysis as a way to detect any deficiencies or abnormalities of body movement."

Chou said that his lab's goal, for now, is to disseminate the findings to the public and to talk to parents, athletic trainers and, perhaps, coaches directly to say: "These are the facts. We may not be able to draw any line on what clinically should or shouldn't be done. However, these are our observations based on our scientific testing."

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Study: Migraines Linked to More Brain Lesions Among Women

Results of a new study show that women who have migraines more commonly have brain lesions, which is associated with cognitive decline.

A new study shows that women who experience migraines have shown a higher prevalence and greater increase in deep white matter hyperintensities (brain lesions) than those who do not. However, the number, frequency, and severity of the migraines the women experienced were not associated with lesion progression.

The study, published this week in theJournal of the American Medical Association, looked at the association between migraine frequency, brain lesions, and cognitive decline. 286 participants in the 2000 Cerebral Abnormalities in Migrane Epidemiological Risk Analysis were given MIR scans in 2009. Researchers found that 77% of the women in the migrane group had progression of brain lesions, compared to 60% of the control group. Among men, no association was found between migraines and brain lesions. The results were controlled for age, sex, hyper tension, diabetes, and level of education.

“In addition, the number of migraines, frequency of migraines, migraine severity, type of migraine, and migraine therapy were not associated with lesion progression,” said the study’s authors. “Increase in deep white matter hyperintensity volume was not significantly associated with poorer cognitive performance at follow-up.”

In the past, brain lesions have been associated with cognitive decline, as well as atherosclerotic disease risk factors and an increased risk of ischemic stoke. Migraines affect up to 15% fo the general population, according to the study’s authors.

“In summary, in a community-based cohort followed up for 9 years, migraine was associated only with a higher incidence of deep white matter brain changes among women,” said the study’s authors. “There were no significant associations of migraine with progression of other brain lesions among women, and there were no associations of migraine headache with progression of any brain lesions among men. These findings raise questions about the role of migraine headaches with progression of cerebral vascular changes. The functional implications of MRI brain lesions in women with migraine and their possible relation with ischemia and ischemic stroke warrant further research.”

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Brain Function in Children With Autism is Improved by Oxytocin

Preliminary results from an ongoing, large-scale study by Yale School of Medicine researchers shows that oxytocin -- a naturally occurring substance produced in the brain and throughout the body -- increased brain function in regions that are known to process social information in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorders (ASD).

A Yale Child Study Center research team that includes postdoctoral fellow Ilanit Gordon and Kevin Pelphrey, the Harris Associate Professor of Child Psychiatry and Psychology, will present the results on May 19 at the International Meeting for Autism Research.

"Our findings provide the first, critical steps toward devising more effective treatments for the core social deficits in autism, which may involve a combination of clinical interventions with an administration of oxytocin," said Gordon. "Such a treatment approach will fundamentally improve our understanding of autism and its treatment."

Social-communicative dysfunctions are a core characteristic of autism, a neurodevelopmental disorder that can have an enormous emotional and financial burden on the affected individual, their families, and society.

Gordon said that while a great deal of progress has been made in the field of autism research, there remain few effective treatments and none that directly target the core social dysfunction. Oxytocin has recently received attention for its involvement in regulating social abilities because of its role in many aspects of social behavior and social cognition in humans and other species.

To assess the impact of oxytocin on the brain function, Gordon and her team conducted a first-of-its-kind, double-blind, placebo-controlled study on children and adolescents aged 7 to 18 with ASD. The team members gave the children a single dose of oxytocin in a nasal spray and used functional magnetic resonance brain imaging to observe its effect.

The team found that oxytocin increased activations in brain regions known to process social information. Gordon said these brain activations were linked to tasks involving multiple social information processing routes, such as seeing, hearing, and processing information relevant to understanding other people.

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Prepregnancy Obesity Linked to Child's Cognitive Function

Women who are obese before they become pregnant are at higher risk of having children with lower cognitive function -- as measured by math and reading tests taken between ages 5 to 7 years -- than are mothers with a healthy prepregnancy weight, new research suggests.

In this large observational study, prepregnancy obesity was associated, on average, with a three-point drop in reading scores and a two-point reduction in math scores on a commonly used test of children's cognitive function.

Previous research has suggested that a woman's prepregnancy obesity can have a negative effect on fetal organs, such as the heart, liver and pancreas. Because fetal development is rapid and sensitive to a mother's physiological characteristics, Ohio State University researchers sought to find out whether a mother's obesity also could affect the fetal brain.

"One way you measure the effects on the brain is by measuring cognition," said Rika Tanda, lead author of the study and a doctoral candidate in nursing at Ohio State.

The research also supported findings in previous studies suggesting that several other conditions affect childhood cognition, including how stimulating the home environment is, family income and a mother's education and cognitive skills.

"The new piece here is we have a measure associated with the fetus's environment to add to that set of potential risk factors," said Pamela Salsberry, senior author of the study and a professor of nursing at Ohio State. "If we have a good way to understand the risks each child is born with, we could tailor the post-birth environment in such a way that they could reach their maximum capabilities."

The research appears online and is scheduled for future print publication in the Maternal and Child Health Journal.

The researchers used data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) 1979 Mother and Child Survey, a nationally representative sample of men and women who were 14-21 years old in December 1978. From that dataset, Tanda collected information on 3,412 children born to NLSY mothers who had been full-term births, were between 5 and almost 7 years old at the time of their interview and who had no diagnosed physical or cognition problems.

In addition to documenting a number of characteristics about the mothers and the family environment, the researchers gauged the children's cognitive function based on their performance on Peabody Individual Achievement Test reading recognition and math assessments.

The researchers calculated the mothers' body mass index (BMI) based on their reported heights and weights. More than half of mothers had normal BMIs before pregnancy, and 9.6 percent were obese, meaning they had a BMI of 30 or higher.

Controlling for all other variables, the analysis showed that maternal prepregnancy obesity was negatively associated with math and reading test scores. Children of obese women scored, on average, three points lower on reading and two points lower on math than did children of healthy-weight women. The mean reading score among all the children was 106.1 points and the mean math score was 99.9.

Though the score differences seem small, Tanda noted that these effects of prepregnancy obesity were equivalent to a seven-year decrease in the mothers' education and significantly lower family income, two other known risk factors that negatively affect childhood cognitive function.

Tanda said clinicians could use these findings to help encourage women patients of childbearing age to maintain a healthy weight, especially if they plan to get pregnant.

"This is a large population study, so at the individual level we can't say that one person's decision to change her weight will change her child's outcome," she said. "But these findings suggest that children born to women who are obese before pregnancy might need extra support."

Added Salsberry, "It's not only for their child's sake. It's also important for the health of the mother. But it is important to understand that maternal obesity during pregnancy could have implications for their children as well."

Without actual measures of women's and fetuses' insulin levels, inflammation and blood sugar readings, scientists can't say for sure how prepregnancy obesity might affect the fetal brain. But previous studies have suggested that a mother's impaired metabolic processes affect the fetal brain cell growth and formation of synapses.

The researchers also noted that obesity doesn't automatically equate to unhealthy.

"There may be two obese moms that in fact have very different metabolic profiles. For the purposes of this study, her weight is a stand-in for biological data that we would like to have but don't," Salsberry said.

Socioeconomic data from the study supported previous findings that several post-birth conditions can have a positive association with higher children's test scores. These include a stimulating home environment with plenty of books, a safe play environment and frequent family meals; higher family income; and higher maternal education levels and cognitive function. Girls and first-born children also performed better on the math and reading tests than did boys and younger siblings.

With all these data combined, Tanda said, the study also reveals how health disparities can have long-lasting effects.

"Young females who grow up poor, who have less access to healthy foods resulting in diets that are of poorer quality, are at higher risk of having children with disadvantages and repeating this cycle," she said.

The researchers are continuing to examine additional influences on childhood cognition, including race, sex and age differences among mothers.

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