Despite their reputation as blood-suckers, mosquitoes actually spend most of their time drinking nectar from flowers. Scientists have identified the chemical cues in flowers that stimulate mosquitoes’ sense of smell and draw them in. Their findings show how cues from flowers can stimulate the mosquito brain as much as a warm-blooded host — information that could help develop less toxic repellents and better traps.
With a $106 million gift from the Weill Family Foundation, UC Berkeley, UC San Francisco and the University of Washington have launched the Weill Neurohub, an innovative research network that will forge and nurture new collaborations between neuroscientists and researchers working in an array of other disciplines — including engineering, computer science, physics, chemistry and mathematics — to speed the development of new therapies for diseases and disorders that affect the brain and nervous system.
A team, led by researchers at the University of Washington, has discovered how the female mosquito brain integrates visual and olfactory signals to identify, track and hone in on a potential host for her next blood meal: After the mosquito’s olfactory system detects certain chemical cues, the mosquito uses her visual system to scan her surroundings for certain shapes and fly toward them, presumably associating those shapes with potential hosts.
Researchers at the University of Washington have developed a set of tools to make MRI studies of our central nervous system easier to share.
In a published Jan. 25 in Current Biology, University of Washington researchers report that mosquitoes can learn to associate a particular odor with an unpleasant mechanical shock akin to being swatted. As a result, they’ll avoid that scent the next time.
Children who suffer traumatic brain injuries can face a difficult road to recovery, requiring services such as physical therapy and mental health treatment for months or years to get their young lives back on track. When those children come from low-income households with limited English proficiency, there can be significant barriers in getting them the care they need. A recent University of Washington study found that less than 20 percent of rehabilitation providers in the state accepted Medicaid and also…
Imagine a question-and-answer game played by two people who are not in the same place and not talking to each other. Round after round, one player asks a series of questions and accurately guesses the object the other is thinking about. Sci-fi? Mind-reading superpowers? Not quite. University of Washington researchers recently used a direct brain-to-brain connection to enable pairs of participants to play a question-and-answer game by transmitting signals from one brain to the other over the Internet. The experiment,…
For more than half a century, scientists have studied how the surface of the body is mapped in parts of the brain associated with touch. That research has focused largely on “body maps” that show how certain parts of the brain correspond point-for-point with the body’s topography. These body maps have been studied extensively in adult humans and other primates, but how they develop in babies, and how they relate to other aspects of infant development, have been little understood….
A team of biologists from the University of Washington and the California Institute of Technology has cracked the cues mosquitoes use to find us.
University of Washington research shows that using a single category of learning disability to qualify students with written language challenges for special education services is not scientifically supported. Some students only have writing disabilities, but some have both reading and writing disabilities. The study, published online in NeuroImage: Clinical, is among the first to identify structural white matter and functional gray matter differences in the brain between children with dyslexia and dysgraphia, and between those children and typical language learners….
News from the UW Health Sciences: Alzheimer’s impact on our aging population, hunger cues, trauma treatment study, avoiding burnout, training new neuroscientists, an AIDS-free generation
New research on how pollinators find flowers when background odors are strong shows that both natural plant odors and human sources of pollution can conceal the scent of sought-after flowers.
More than a million people are treated for mild traumatic brain injuries in U.S. hospitals and emergency rooms each year. A University of Washington researcher has found that a 20-minute conversation with a social worker has the potential to significantly reduce the functional decline of those diagnosed with a mild traumatic brain injury.
The national, decade-long ACTIVE study showed that cognitive training can help the elderly maintain certain thinking and reasoning skills useful in everyday life.
Clark was recognized for his work in the neurobiology of motivated behavior. His award will support investigations of how alcohol exposure during the teen years might lead to chronic alcoholism in adults.
Future diabetes treatment approaches might target regulatory systems in both the brain and the pancreas to achieve better blood glucose control, or even put the disease into remission.
UW injury expert Dr. Fred Rivara was vice chair of the committee. Its report recommends actions to reduce the occurrence and consequences of youth concussions in sports and in the military, and stresses the need to better understand their nature and treatment.
University of Washington researchers have performed what they believe is the first noninvasive human-to-human brain interface, with one researcher able to send a brain signal via the Internet to control the hand motions of a fellow researcher.
Between ages three and 10, children with autism spectrum disorder exhibit distinct brain chemical changes that differ from children with developmental delays and children with typical development.
New study suggests dietary nicotine may protect against this disorder, which results from the loss of dopamine-producing brain cells.
Low pituitary hormone levels can mimic symptoms of depression and post-traumatic stress syndrome, but are easily treated.
Neurosurgeon Eric Holland has been recruited to establish a preeminent brain cancer program at UW Medicine and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Institute.
The genetic variants disturb the functioning of the same brain signal receptors affected by hallucinogenic drugs.
Moths are able to enjoy a pollinator’s buffet of flowers because of two distinct “channels” in their brains, scientists have discovered.