Featured news
15 Dec 2023
As part of Frontiers’ passion to make science available to all, we highlight just a small selection of the most fascinating research published with us each month to help inspire current and future researchers to achieve their research dreams. 2023 was no different, and saw many game-changing discoveries contribute to the world’s breadth of knowledge.
Featured news
16 Oct 2023
by Deborah Pirchner, Frontiers science writer Image: Shutterstock.com At Frontiers, we bring some of the world’s best research to a global audience. But with tens of thousands of articles published each year, it’s impossible to cover all of them. Here are just five amazing papers you may have missed. Chronic pain associated with increased dementia risk Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) make up approximately 80% of the more than 47 million cases of dementia worldwide. Looking into the future, cases are expected to increase sharply in the coming decades. A large percentage of the older population is also affected by chronic pain, a leading cause of disability that shares many risk factors with ADRD. These include advanced age, depressive disorders, diabetes, obesity, social isolation, and a low level of education. Now, researchers in France have assessed the impact of chronic pain on the incidence of ADRD. They published their results in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience. They found that the presence of chronic pain is associated with a higher incidence and risk of developing ADRD when compared with older adults with no chronic pain. The researchers stressed the importance of prevention, diagnosis, and management of chronic pain to limit resulting […]
Featured news
23 Aug 2023
By Mischa Dijkstra, Frontiers science writer Researchers analyzed health information on middle-aged and senior participants in the UK Biobank. They showed that those who took part in adult education classes had a 19% lower risk of developing dementia within five years of follow-up. Adult education also appeared to help preserve nonverbal reasoning performance and fluid intelligence. How can we best keep our brain fit as we grow older? It’s well known that regular cognitive activity, for example brainteasers, sudokus, or certain video games in middle and old age tends to protect against cognitive decline and dementias like Alzheimer’s. But many of us regularly engage in adult education classes, for example learning a language or a new skill. Is such adult education likewise associated with a lower risk of cognitive decline and dementia? Yes, according to researchers from the Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer of Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan who have shown this for the first time, in a new study in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience. “Here we show that people who take adult education classes have a lower risk of developing dementia five years later,” said Dr Hikaru Takeuchi, an associate professor and the study’s first […]
Featured news
05 Jun 2023
By Deborah Pirchner, Frontiers science writer Image: Shutterstock.com At Frontiers, we bring some of the world’s best research to a global audience. But with tens of thousands of articles published each year, it’s impossible to cover all of them. Here are just five amazing papers you may have missed. What happens to the brain when we die? The mystery of what happens in the brain when we die has fascinated humans for centuries. Despite understanding gained from recent studies, there still are open questions – not lastly because obtaining data about the last moments of life is difficult. Researchers largely have to rely on descriptions of near-death-experience survivors. To fill knowledge gaps, these accounts are immensely valuable. Now, in a review article published in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, an international team of researchers has reviewed the current knowledge on what neurophysiological changes occur in the brain during these experiences. They also examined what anatomical correlates to these changes are, and how drugs and metabolic factors are involved. Understanding the underlying neurophysiological changes in the dying human brain could be the only way to decipher the neurophysiology of death, the scientists noted. Descriptions from near-death survivors may be our only […]
Featured news
06 Dec 2022
By Frontiers’ science writers Image: Shutterstock.com As part of Frontiers’ passion to make science available to all, we highlight just a small selection of the most fascinating research published with us each month to help inspire current and future researchers to achieve their research dreams. 2022 was no different, and saw many game-changing discoveries contribute to the world’s breadth of knowledge on topics ranging from the climate crisis to robotics, and exercise to the lives of our ancestors. So to round of the year, here are 10 Frontiers articles from this year that got the world’s top media talking. 1. This illusion, new to science, is strong enough to trick our reflexes Have a look at the image below. Do you perceive that the central black hole is expanding, as if you’re moving into a dark environment, or falling into a hole? If so, you’re not alone: a study published to Frontiers in Human Neuroscience showed that this ‘expanding hole’ illusion, which is new to science, is perceived by approximately 86% of people. The researchers don’t yet know why a minority seem unsusceptible to the ‘expanding hole’ illusion. Nor do they know whether other vertebrate species, or even nonvertebrate animals […]
Featured news
30 Nov 2022
By Conn Hastings, science writer Image: BlurryMe/Shutterstock.com Alzheimer’s disease can remain undetected until it is too late to treat. Large-scale screening programs could help to detect early-stage disease, but current diagnostic methods are too cumbersome and expensive. A new study published to Frontiers is the first to identify formic acid as a sensitive urinary biomarker that can reveal early-stage Alzheimer’s disease, potentially paving the way for inexpensive and convenient disease screening. Could a simple urine test reveal if someone has early-stage Alzheimer’s disease and could this pave the way for large-scale screening programs? A new study in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience certainly suggests so. The researchers tested a large group of patients with Alzheimer’s disease of different levels of severity and healthy controls with normal cognition to identify differences in urinary biomarkers. They found that urinary formic acid is a sensitive marker of subjective cognitive decline that may indicate the very early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Current methods to diagnose Alzheimer’s are expensive, inconvenient, and unsuitable for routine screening. This means that most patients only receive a diagnosis when it is too late for effective treatment. However, a non-invasive, inexpensive, and convenient urine test for formic acid could be […]
Featured news
18 Jul 2022
By Colm Gorey, Frontiers science communications manager Image: Shutterstock.com At Frontiers, we bring some of the world’s best research to a global audience. But with tens of thousands of articles published each year, many often fly under the radar. Here are just five amazing papers you may have missed. Impact of Alzheimer’s on the brain may be greater than previously thought A significant review of more than 200,000 scientific publications has shown that the effects of Alzheimer’s disease on the brain are far broader than initially thought. Writing in their review article in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, the international team of researchers said that they wanted to understand the breadth and diversity of biological pathways – key molecular chain reactions that drive changes in cells – that contribute to Alzheimer’s disease by research over the last 30 years. They found that while nearly all known pathways have been linked to the disease, the most frequently associated biological mechanisms have not significantly changed in the last three decades, despite major technological advances. These include those related to the immune system, metabolism, and long-term depression. They also found that the top-ranked 30 pathways most frequently referred to in literature remained relatively consistent […]
Featured news
09 Jun 2022
By Colm Gorey, Frontiers Science Communications Manager Image: Jean Beaufort At Frontiers, we bring some of the world’s best research to a global audience. But with tens of thousands of articles published each year, many often fly under the radar. Here are just five amazing papers you may have missed. Daily eating of cranberries may give us a memory boost and lower ‘bad’ cholesterol The famous proverb says that an apple a day keeps the doctor away, but a recent study published to Frontiers in Nutrition has found that significant health benefits may come from eating a cup of cranberries a day. A team of researchers from the UK, the Netherlands, and Italy set out to see what benefits this daily dose of the popular berry would have on those aged between 50 and 80. Of those taking part in the study, half ate freeze-dried cranberry powder equivalent to 100g of fresh cranberries, while the other half were given a placebo. The results showed that those who were eating cranberries daily saw a significant improvement in their memory of everyday events, neural functioning, and delivery of blood to the brain. The researchers hope that their findings could have implications for […]
Climate action
05 Apr 2022
By Colm Gorey, Frontiers Science Communications Manager Image: Shutterstock.com At Frontiers, we bring some of the world’s best research to a global audience. But with tens of thousands of articles published each year, many often fly under the radar. Now, as part of new series each month, Frontiers will highlight just some of those amazing papers you may have missed. The Unseen Effects of Deforestation: Biophysical Effects on Climate Research published to Frontiers in Forests and Global Change offers the most comprehensive and detailed evidence to date that forests are more important to the climate – both globally and locally – than we think due to the way in which they physically transform the atmosphere. The first-ever research conducted by a team from the US pinpointed the local, regional and global non-CO2 benefits of specific forest zones worldwide to find that the entire world gains the most benefits from the band of tropical rainforests spanning Latin America, central Africa and Southeast Asia. It finds that, together, forests keep the planet at least half of a degree Celsius cooler when we account for the understudied biophysical effects – from chemical compounds to turbulence and the reflection of light. These effects in […]
Neuroscience
28 Mar 2022
By Colm Gorey, Frontiers Science Communications Manager Image: Shutterstock.com Each month, Frontiers shines a spotlight on some of the leading research across a wide range of topics. Here are just some of the highlights that resonated strongly with readers on our news site in the month of February. A replay of life: What happens in our brain when we die? Imagine reliving your entire life in the space of seconds. Like a flash of lightning, you are outside of your body, watching memorable moments you lived through. This process, known as ‘life recall’, can be similar to what it’s like to have a near-death experience. What happens inside your brain during these experiences and after death are questions that have puzzled neuroscientists for centuries. However, a new study published to Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience suggests that your brain may remain active and coordinated during and even after the transition to death, and be programmed to orchestrate the whole ordeal. Article link: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnagi.2022.813531/full 2. Eating vegetables does not protect against cardiovascular disease, finds large-scale study A long-term ‘UK Biobank’ study on almost 400,000 people published to Frontiers in Nutrition found little or no evidence that differences in the amount of consumed cooked or […]
Featured news
22 Feb 2022
By Maryam Clark, science writer Image: Okrasiuk/Shutterstock.com Neuroscientists have recorded the activity of a dying human brain and discovered rhythmic brain wave patterns around the time of death that are similar to those occurring during dreaming, memory recall, and meditation. Now, a study published to Frontiers brings new insight into a possible organizational role of the brain during death and suggests an explanation for vivid life recall in near-death experiences. Imagine reliving your entire life in the space of seconds. Like a flash of lightning, you are outside of your body, watching memorable moments you lived through. This process, known as ‘life recall’, can be similar to what it’s like to have a near-death experience. What happens inside your brain during these experiences and after death are questions that have puzzled neuroscientists for centuries. However, a new study published to Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience suggests that your brain may remain active and coordinated during and even after the transition to death, and be programmed to orchestrate the whole ordeal. When an 87-year-old patient developed epilepsy, Dr Raul Vicente of the University of Tartu, Estonia and colleagues used continuous electroencephalography (EEG) to detect the seizures and treat the patient. During these […]
Featured news
23 Jun 2019
Brain imaging and spinal fluid analysis could help to guide the use of future preventive treatments for Alzheimer’s; Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience
Featured news
21 Jan 2019
UAlberta researchers have identified biomarkers for identifying Alzheimer’s and mild cognitive impairment in saliva samples; Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience
Featured news
27 Nov 2018
New research show increased brain activity in rodents fed a ketogenic or calorie-restricted diet; Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience:
Featured news
02 Nov 2018
The virus responsible for cold sores has been strongly linked to the development of Alzheimer’s disease; Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience