Mobile phones can cause brain tumours, court rules.

A landmark court case has ruled there is a link between using a mobile phone and brain tumours, paving the way for a flood of legal actions.

By Richard Alleyne

The Telegraph UK, 19 Oct 2012

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/9619514/Mobile-phones-can-cause-brain-tumours-court-rules..html

Innocente Marcolini, 60, an Italian businessman, fell ill after using a handset at work for up to six hours every day for 12 years.

Now Italy's Supreme Court in Rome has blamed his phone saying there is a "causal link" between his illness and phone use, the Sun has reported.

Mr Marcolini said: "This is significant for very many people. I wanted this problem to become public because many people still do not know the risks.

"I was on the phone, usually the mobile, for at least five or six hours every day at work.

"I wanted it recognised that there was a link between my illness and the use of mobile and cordless phones.

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"Parents need to know their children are at risk of this illness."

British scientists have claimed there is insufficient evidence to prove any link to mobiles.

But the respected oncologist and professor of environmental mutagenesis Angelo Gino Levis gave evidence for Mr Marcolini — along with neurosurgeon Dr Giuseppe Grasso.

They said electromagnetic radiation emitted by mobile and cordless phones can damage cells, making tumours more likely.

Prof Levis told The Sun: "The court decision is extremely important. It finally officially recognises the link.

"It'll open not a road but a motorway to legal actions by victims. We're considering a class action."

Mr Marcolini's tumour was discovered in the trigeminal nerve — close to where the phone touched his head.

It is non-cancerous but threatened to kill him as it spread to the carotid artery, the major vessel carrying blood to his brain.

His face was left paralysed and he takes daily morphine for pain.

Alasdair Philips of Powerwatch, which campaigns for more research on mobile use, said: "This is an interesting case and proves the need for more studies.

"People should limit mobile and cordless use until we know more."

The World Health Organisation urged limits on mobile use last year, calling them a Class B carcinogen.

But a spokesman for Britain's Health Protection Agency said: "The scientific consensus is that mobile phones do not cause cancer."

International radiation biology expert Michael Repacholi said: "Studies show no evidence of cancer. But if you are worried, use a headset, hands-free or loudspeaker."

Media lawyer Mark Stephens said the verdict could "open the floodgates" — even though there is no direct obligation on British courts to follow the Italians' lead.

He said: "It is possible people will begin legal action here, but I think the chances of success are less. I think they'll join any class action in Italy."

Soil Bacteria Work In Similar Way To Antidepressants

UK scientists suggest that a type of friendly bacteria found in soil may affect the brain in a similar way to antidepressants.

Their findings are published in the early online edition of the journal Neuroscience.

Researchers from Bristol University and University College London discovered using laboratory mice, that a "friendly" bacteria commonly found in soil activated brain cells to produce the brain chemical serotonin and altered the mice's behaviour in a similar way to antidepressants.

They are suggesting this could explain why immune system imbalance could make some people vulnerable to mood disorders like depression.

Lead author, Dr Chris Lowry from Bristol University said, "These studies help us understand how the body communicates with the brain and why a healthy immune system is important for maintaining mental health". 

"They also leave us wondering if we shouldn't all be spending more time playing in the dirt," he added.

Read More:

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/66840.php

Stress shrank brain area of Japan tsunami survivors: study

Emotional stress caused by last year's tsunami caused a part of some survivors' brains to shrink, according to scientists in Japan who grasped a unique chance to study the neurological effects of trauma.

On a quest to better understand post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), the researchers compared brain scans they had taken of 42 healthy adolescents in other studies in the two years before the killer wave, with new images taken three to four months thereafter.

Among those with PTSD symptoms, they found a shrinking in the orbitofrontal cortex, a part of the brain involved in decision-making and the regulation of emotion, said a study published Tuesday in the Nature journal Molecular Psychiatry.

"The changed volumes in the orbitofrontal cortex are correlated to the severity of PTSD symptoms," author Atsushi Sekiguchi told AFP.

Previous studies had already suggested that PTSD patients undergo changes to the brain, but this is the first to pinpoint which part of the organ is altered by trauma.

The full implications of these findings are so far unclear, but there could be an early benefit for doctors and patients. Telltale changes in brain volume may help easier diagnoses of PTSD and timely treatment with psychotherapy.

Read More:

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Stress_shrank_brain_area_of_Japan_tsunami_survivors_study_999.html

Max Planck Gesellschaft - Rare neurons discovered in monkey brains

Max Planck scientists discover brain cells in monkeys that may be linked to self-awareness and empathy in humans

The anterior insular cortex is a small brain region that plays a crucial role in human self-awareness and in related neuropsychiatric disorders. A unique cell type – the von Economo neuron (VEN) – is located there. For a long time, the VEN was assumed to be unique to humans, great apes, whales and elephants. Henry Evrard, neuroanatomist at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tübingen, Germany, now discovered that the VEN occurs also in the insula of macaque monkeys. The morphology, size and distribution of the monkey VEN suggest that it is at least a primal anatomical homolog of the human VEN. This finding offers new and much-needed opportunities to examine in detail the connections and functions of a cell and brain region that could have a key role in human self-awareness and in mental disorders including autism and specific forms of dementia.

The insular cortex, or simply insula, is a hidden cortical region folded and tucked away deep in the brain – an island within the cortex. Within the last decade, the insula has emerged from darkness as having a key role in diverse functions usually linked to our internal bodily states, to our emotions, to our self-awareness, and to our social interactions. The very anterior part of the insula in particular is where humans consciously sense subjective emotions, such as love, hate, resentment, self-confidence or embarrassment. In relation to these feelings, the anterior insula is involved in various psychopathologies. Damage of the insula leads to apathy, and to the inability to tell what feelings we or our conversational partner experience. These inabilities and alteration of the insula are also encountered in autism and other highly detrimental neuropsychiatric disorders including the behavioural variant of frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD).

Read More:

http://www.mpg.de/5808445/von_economo_neurons

Sugar makes you stupid

Attention, college students cramming between midterms and finals: Binging on soda and sweets for as little as six weeks may make you stupid.

A new UCLA rat study is the first to show how a diet steadily high in fructose slows the brain, hampering memory and learning — and how omega-3 fatty acids can counteract the disruption. The peer-reviewed Journal of Physiology publishes the findings in its May 15 edition.

"Our findings illustrate that what you eat affects how you think," said Fernando Gomez-Pinilla, a professor of neurosurgery at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and a professor of integrative biology and physiology in the UCLA College of Letters and Science. "Eating a high-fructose diet over the long term alters your brain's ability to learn and remember information. But adding omega-3 fatty acids to your meals can help minimize the damage."

While earlier research has revealed how fructose harms the body through its role in diabetes, obesity and fatty liver, this study is the first to uncover how the sweetener influences the brain.

The UCLA team zeroed in on high-fructose corn syrup, an inexpensive liquid six times sweeter than cane sugar, that is commonly added to processed foods, including soft drinks, condiments, applesauce and baby food. The average American consumes more than 40 pounds of high-fructose corn syrup per year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Read More:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-05/uoc--smy051512.php

End of anti-depressants? Magnetic pulse therapy eases depression in third of patients

Depression affects one in four of us at some point of our lives, but controversy still reigns over how to best treat the debilitating condition.

Now scientists have found that a type of 'magnetic therapy' - which involves no brain-altering drugs or invasive procedures - could be a potent new treatment.

A team from the University of California Los Angeles were testing NeuroStar TMS Therapy, which works by beaming magnetic pulses through the skull. These trigger small electrical charges that spark brain cells to fire.

Results from tests on more than 300 patients with severe depression found 58 per cent achieved a positive response while more than a third (37 per cent) went into remission.

The study was released at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association.

Research leader Dr Ian Cook, said: 'The improvements we observed show that non-drug therapy with NeuroStar TMS not only reduces the symptomatic suffering of patients, but lessens the disability of depression with important implications for these individuals' ability to return to functioning effectively at home, in the workplace, and in the community.'

All the patients filled in a health questionnaire before and after the treatment.

Read More:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2141755/End-anti-depressants-Magnetic-pulse-therapy-eases-depression-patients.html

Babies' brains benefit from music lessons, researchers find

After completing the first study of its kind, researchers at McMaster University have discovered that very early musical training benefits children even before they can walk or talk.

They found that one-year-old babies who participate in interactive music classes with their parents smile more, communicate better and show earlier and more sophisticated brain responses to music.

The findings were published recently in the scientific journals Developmental Science and Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences.

"Many past studies of musical training have focused on older children," says Laurel Trainor, director of the McMaster Institute for Music and the Mind. "Our results suggest that the infant brain might be particularly plastic with regard to musical exposure."

Trainor, together with David Gerry, a music educator and graduate student, received an award from the Grammy Foundation in 2008 to study the effects of musical training in infancy. In the recent study, groups of babies and their parents spent six months participating in one of two types of weekly music instruction.

Read More:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-05/mu-bbb050912.php

Purpose in life may protect against harmful changes in the brain associated with Alzheimer's disease

Greater purpose in life may help stave off the harmful effects of plaques and tangles associated with Alzheimer's disease, according to a new study by researchers at Rush University Medical Center. The study, published in the May issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry, is available online at www.archgenpsychiatry.com.

"Our study showed that people who reported greater purpose in life exhibited better cognition than those with less purpose in life even as plaques and tangles accumulated in their brains," said Patricia A. Boyle, PhD.

"These findings suggest that purpose in life protects against the harmful effects of plaques and tangles on memory and other thinking abilities. This is encouraging and suggests that engaging in meaningful and purposeful activities promotes cognitive health in old age."

Boyle and her colleagues from the Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center studied 246 participants from the Rush Memory and Aging Project who did not have dementia and who subsequently died and underwent brain autopsy. Participants received an annual clinical evaluation for up to approximately 10 years, which included detailed cognitive testing and neurological exams.

Read More:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-05/rumc-pil050412.php

Pesticide exposure linked to brain changes: study

When pregnant women are exposed to moderate levels of a common pesticide, their children may experience lasting changes in brain structure linked to lower intelligence, a US study said Monday.

The study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences examined New York City pregnant mothers who were tested for exposure to chlorpyrifos, or CPF, which is widely used for pest control in farms and public spaces.

The women in the study, which included 369 subjects total, took part prior to 2001 when CPF was banned from household use in the United States, though the chemical continues to be used worldwide in agriculture.

Researchers compared 20 children -- age five to 11 -- whose mothers tested highest for levels of CPF and found "significant abnormalities" in brain structure compared to 20 children whose mothers showed lower exposures.

Read More:

http://www.seeddaily.com/reports/Pesticide_exposure_linked_to_brain_changes_study_999.html

Robert Fisk - The Children of Fallujah - the hospital of horrors

The pictures flash up on a screen on an upper floor of the Fallujah General Hospital. And all at once, Nadhem Shokr al-Hadidi's administration office becomes a little chamber of horrors. A baby with a hugely deformed mouth. A child with a defect of the spinal cord, material from the spine outside the body. A baby with a terrible, vast Cyclopean eye. Another baby with only half a head, stillborn like the rest, date of birth 17 June, 2009. Yet another picture flicks onto the screen: date of birth 6 July 2009, it shows a tiny child with half a right arm, no left leg, no genitalia.

"We see this all the time now," Al-Hadidi says, and a female doctor walks into the room and glances at the screen. She has delivered some of these still-born children. "I've never seen anything as bad as this in all my service," she says quietly. Al-Hadidi takes phone calls, greets visitors to his office, offers tea and biscuits to us while this ghastly picture show unfolds on the screen. I asked to see these photographs, to ensure that the stillborn children, the deformities, were real. There's always a reader or a viewer who will mutter the word "propaganda" under their breath.

But the photographs are a damning, ghastly reward for such doubts. January 7, 2010: a baby with faded, yellow skin and misshapen arms. April 26, 2010: a grey mass on the side of the baby's head. A doctor beside me speaks of "Tetralogy of Fallot", a transposition of the great blood vessels. May 3, 2010: a frog-like creature in which – the Fallujah doctor who came into the room says this – "all the abdominal organs are trying to get outside the body."

Read More:

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/fisk/robert-fisk-the-children-of-fallujah--the-hospital-of-horrors-7679168.html#