‘Cleverly designed' MRI sensors detect dopamine, offering a high-resolution look at what’s happening inside the brain.
by Anne Trafton
For neuroscientists, one of the best ways to study brain activity is with a scanning technique called functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which reveals blood flow in the brain.
However, although fMRI is a powerful tool for identifying brain regions that are active during a particular task, it offers only an indirect view of what’s happening. Measuring a more direct indicator of neural activity, such as concentrations of neurotransmitters (brain chemicals that carry messages between neurons) could be much more valuable.
Read more: New Technique Offers a More Detailed View of Brain Activity
by Michael Patrick Rutter
The Case cryo-imaging system enables high resolution, 3D mapping of fluorescently-labeled stem and cancer cells throughout the mouse. The system consists of a mouse-sized cryomicrotome; microscope; low light camera; three axis robotic positioning system; and automation, visualization, and analysis software. It provides 3D fluoresence/bright-field imaging of the block face following serial sectioning. We made tail vein injections of about 5 million Lewis lung carcinoma (LLC) cells, a cell line used for studies of metastatic cancer and therapies. Seven days post injection, cryo-imaging surveys identified cells in the liver, adrenal gland, and tail near the injection site.
Researchers have long suspected that overweight people tend to have large fat deposits in their pancreases, but they’ve been unable to confirm or calculate how much fat resides there because of the organ’s location.
Berkeley, CA — There’s a new way to explore biology’s secrets. With a flash of light, scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California, Berkeley zeroed in on the type of neural cell that controls swimming in larval zebrafish.
If you wanted to perform a single run of a current model of the explosion of a star on your home computer, it would take more than three years just to download the data. In order to do cutting-edge astrophysics research, scientists need a way to more quickly compile, execute and especially visualize these incredibly complex simulations.