Adapted cold shower as a potential treatment for depression

Depression is a debilitating mood disorder that is among the top causes of disability worldwide. It can be characterized by a set of somatic, emotional, and behavioral symptoms, one of which is a high risk of suicide. This work presents a hypothesis that depression may be caused by the convergence of two factors: (A) A lifestyle that lacks certain physiological stressors that have been experienced by primates through millions of years of evolution, such as brief changes in body temperature (e.g. cold swim), and this lack of “thermal exercise” may cause inadequate functioning of the brain. (B) Genetic makeup that predisposes an individual to be affected by the above condition more seriously than other people.

Read the article “Adapted cold shower as a potential treatment for depression” here. 

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17993252/

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5854059_Adapted_cold_shower_as_a_potential_treatment_for_depression

https://www.healthline.com/health/anxiety/cold-shower-for-anxiety#how-it-works

Quantum sensors for brain research

Brain researchers have high hopes for quantum sensors to provide deeper insights into the brain one day. This is also a research focus of Fraunhofer IPM. Two events in December provided an insight into the topic: Professor Svenja Knappe delivered a public Carl-Zeiss-Humboldt Lecture to show how quantum sensor technology could advance brain diagnostics and therapy, and an experts’ workshop explored the topic of optically pumped magnetometers for magnetoencephalography.

Read the article “Quantum sensors for brain research” here. 

The McKnight Brain Research Foundation Releases Survey Showing Majority of People Feel Uninformed About What’s Normal and What to Expect as the Brain Ages

The McKnight Brain Research Foundation today released findings from a new survey showing one-third of Americans feel uninformed about normal brain aging. In addition, 87% of Americans are concerned about experiencing age-related memory loss and a decline in brain function as they grow older. To educate the public about normal brain aging, also known as cognitive aging, the MBRF is launching a new campaign, Brain Works – Optimize Your Brain Span.

Read the article “The McKnight Brain Research Foundation Releases Survey Showing Majority of People Feel Uninformed About What’s Normal and What to Expect as the Brain Ages” here. 

SOCIETY FOR BRAIN MAPPING AND THERAPEUTICS

https://www.worldbrainmapping.org/home/about/press-releases/

Hertie-Institut für klinische Hirnforschung

Migraine: Tracking down the tsunami in the brain

The Journal of Clinical Investigation

Hyperexcitable interneurons trigger cortical spreading depression in an Scn1a migraine model.

How can patients and therapists use this information about depression in a migraine model?

Illusory generalizability of clinical prediction models

“A central promise of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare is that large datasets can be mined to predict and identify the best course of care for future patients. Unfortunately, we do not know how these models would perform on new patients because they are rarely tested prospectively on truly independent patient samples. Chekroud et al. showed that machine learning models routinely achieve perfect performance in one dataset even when that dataset is a large international multisite clinical trial (see the Perspective by Petzschner). However, when that exact model was tested in truly independent clinical trials, performance fell to chance levels. Even when building what should be a more robust model by aggregating across a group of similar multisite trials, subsequent predictive performance remained poor.” —Peter Stern

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adg8538