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The anatomical connectivity among neurons has been experimentally found to be largely non-random across brain areas. This means that certain connectivity motifs occur at a higher frequency than would be expected by chance. Of particular interest, short-ter ...
Brain energy consumption is high and a very tightly regulated energy metabolism ensures correct performance. Neurons, the cells responsible for transmitting information via synapses, interact very closely with star shaped glial cells called astrocytes. Ast ...
The brain has very high energy demands that are mainly met by the circulating blood glucose to ensure its proper functioning. Thus, it is not surprising that though the human brain weighs only 2- 3% of the body weight, it consumes approximately 25% of tota ...
Experimentally mapping synaptic connections, in terms of the numbers and locations of their synapses and estimating connection probabilities, is still not a tractable task, even for small volumes of tissue. In fact, the six layers of the neocortex contain ...
Insomnia is a serious medical and social problem, its prevalence in the general population ranges from 9 to 35% depending on the country and assessment method. Often, patients are subject to inappropriate and therefore dangerous pharmacotherapies that incl ...
What is the neuroanatomical basis for the decline in brain function that occurs during normal aging? Previous postmortem studies have blamed it on a reduction in spine density, though results remain controversial and spine dynamics were not assessed. We us ...
Neuronal firing, synaptic transmission, and its plasticity form the building blocks for processing and storage of information in the brain. It is unknown whether adult human synapses are more efficient in transferring information between neurons than roden ...
Functional brain imaging studies show that in certain brain regions glucose utilization exceeds oxygen consumption, indicating the predominance of aerobic glycolysis. In this issue, Goyal et al. (2014) report that this metabolic profile is associated with ...
Neurons are arranged in networks in which they communicate between each other by the means of synapses. Synaptic transmission can undergo activity-dependent and short-lived changes in strength, known as short-term synaptic plasticity. Short-term plasticity ...
Sleep wake cycle is characterized by changes in neuronal network activity. However, for the last decade there is increasing evidence that neuroglial interaction may play a role in the modulation of sleep homeostasis and that astrocytes have a critical impa ...
