Serotonin and Violence
Dean Hamer, Director of the Gene Structure and Regulation Unit at the National Cancer Institute, continues his comments about serotonin. Dr. Hamer explains that in addition to making people feel depressed, serotonin seems to also trigger hostility i...
Alzheimer's Disease and Aging
Dr. Andrew Leuchter, Director of Adult Psychiatry at UCLA, talks about the way Alzheimer's disease sometimes presents itself as people age. Dr. Leuchter also discusses the impact of the illness, particularly when the afflicted individual has lost pa...
Alzheimer's Disease: Prevention and Protection (Part One)
Dr. Andrew Leuchter, Director of Adult Psychiatry at UCLA, talks about the possible links between intellectual activity and Alzheimer's disease. "I'm a firm believer in use it or lose it," Dr. Leuchter explains. He also notes that, "...the rates of ...
Serotonin
Dean Hamer, Director of the Gene Structure and Regulation Unit at the National Cancer Institute, talks about the chemical serotonin and the role it plays in the brain. As it turns out, harm avoidance is controlled by serotonin. Unfortunately, this c...
Windows of Vulnerability
Dr. Andrew Leuchter, Director of Adult Psychiatry at UCLA, talks about times in life (for example, in one's twenties and thirties) when people have what he calls, "a large window of vulnerability" for various illnesses, including bipolar disorder (m...
Schizophrenia and the Brain
Dr. Andrew Leuchter, Director of Adult Psychiatry at UCLA, talks about studies showing distinctive features in the brains and brain function of many schizophrenic patients.
Alzheimer's Disease and the Brain
Dr. Andrew Leuchter, Director of Adult Psychiatry at UCLA, explains that the brains of those afflicted with Alzheimer's disease have , "... characteristic neuropathology if one looks at the hippocampus area, which is the area that is most involved i...
Alzheimer's Disease: Prevention and Protection (Part Two)
Dr. Andrew Leuchter, Director of Adult Psychiatry at UCLA, talks about research into possible preventive measures for Alzheimer's disease. "In women, there's some suggestion that estrogen replacement therapy may help to prevent or delay the onset of...
The Most Amazing Machine: Brain Specialization: What It Involves and Does Not Involve
The brain has developed clever strategies to invest more in the development of specific abilities on one side than the other. Because the brain engages in this kind of specialization some people ask where the elements of our personalities are ...
The Most Amazing Machine: Influence of Neurotransmitters, The
After the electrical signal, also called the action potential, reaches the end of the axon it stimulates the release of chemicals called neurotransmitters. These chemical messengers carry information from the sending neuron across the synaptic gap...