Measuring very small changes in the brain’s magnetic fields could lead to a better understanding of maladies such as epilepsy, post-traumatic stress disorder, and traumatic brain injury, but the equipment used for such measurements today is bulky and expensive. Scientists and engineers at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) want to address that issue by creating a new generation of atomic magnetometers based on clouds of rubidium atoms.(more…)
Head injuries can harm hundreds of genes in the brain in a way that increases people’s risk for a wide range of neurological and psychiatric disorders, UCLA life scientists report.(more…)
Democrats need a new candidate, desperately. A sick Hillary Clinton offers no prospect even for a head-to-head competition with the Republican candidate Donald Trump, let alone if there’s any chance to winning the November election.(more…)
As debate increases about whether female lacrosse players should wear headgear, a new study reports measurements of the accelerations that stick blows deliver to the head. The study also measured the dampening effect of various kinds of headgear.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Lacrosse players swing hard, which is why errant stick blows are the leading cause of concussion in girls’ and women’s lacrosse. In a new study, researchers measured how much the worst blows accelerate the head and how much different kinds of headgear could reduce those accelerations. (more…)
After brain injury, cells on ‘high alert’ prolong immune response, affecting behavior
COLUMBUS, Ohio – A head injury can lead immune-system brain cells to go on “high alert” and overreact to later immune challenges by becoming excessively inflammatory – a condition linked with depressive complications, a new animal study suggests.
The findings could help explain some of the midlife mental-health issues suffered by individuals who experience multiple concussions as young adults, researchers say. And these depressive symptoms are likely inflammation-related, which means they may not respond to common antidepressants. (more…)
Improvised explosive devices (IEDs) are becoming a global problem for the U.S. armed forces. To prevent injuries to soldiers and provide better care to those who are injured, the U.S. military is striving to better understand how blasts impact the human body.
In 2011 the Army’s Rapid Equipping Force (REF) approached the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) as part of the DOD Information Analysis Center (IAC) program to develop a system that measures the physical environment of an explosion and collects data that can be used to correlate what the soldier experienced with long-term medical outcomes, especially traumatic brain injury. The solution: the Integrated Blast Effect Sensor Suite (IBESS). IBESS is the first system to acquire integrated, time-tagged data during an explosive event – whether soldiers are on the ground or riding in a vehicle – and can later help recreate a holistic picture of what happened. (more…)
Bedside Early-Warning System from IBM and Excel Medical Electronics Can Analyze Large Amounts of Data in Real Time to Predict Dangerous Changes in a Patient’s Condition
Armonk, N.Y. and Los Angeles, CA – 26 Mar 2013: IBM, and Excel Medical Electronics (EME) are collaborating with the UCLA Department of Neurosurgery in a study to test the effectiveness of a real-time alarm intended to predict rising brain pressure in patients with traumatic brain injuries. The experimental system uses big data analytics software developed by IBM Research and EME that analyzes in real-time streams of vital signs continuously collected from the bedside monitor to spot subtle changes in the patient’s pulse, blood and intracranial pressure, heart activity, and respiration, signaling that dangerous high-risk increases in brain pressure are on the way. (more…)
Technique may lead to earlier diagnosis, tracking of brain disorders in athletes
Sports-related concussions and mild traumatic brain injuries have grabbed headlines in recent months, as the long-term damage they can cause becomes increasingly evident among both current and former athletes. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that millions of these injuries occur each year.
Despite the devastating consequences of traumatic brain injury and the large number of athletes playing contact sports who are at risk, no method has been developed for early detection or tracking of the brain pathology associated with these injuries. (more…)
