scholarly journals Age-related mushroom body expansion in male sweat bees and bumble bees

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mallory A. Hagadorn ◽  
Karlee Eck ◽  
Matthew Del Grosso ◽  
Xavier Haemmerle ◽  
William T. Wcislo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Brain Plasticity ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Sweat Bee ◽  
Developmental Patterns ◽  
Megalopta Genalis ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Relevant Role ◽  
Brain Changes ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Developmental Maturation

AbstractA well-documented phenomenon among social insects is that brain changes occur prior to or at the onset of certain experiences, potentially serving to prime the brain for specific tasks. This insight comes almost exclusively from studies considering developmental maturation in females. As a result, it is unclear whether age-related brain plasticity is consistent across sexes, and to what extent developmental patterns differ. Using confocal microscopy and volumetric analyses, we investigated age-related brain changes coinciding with sexual maturation in the males of the facultatively eusocial sweat bee, Megalopta genalis, and the obligately eusocial bumble bee, Bombus impatiens. We compared volumetric measurements between newly eclosed and reproductively mature males kept isolated in the lab. We found expansion of the mushroom bodies—brain regions associated with learning and memory—with maturation, which were consistent across both species. This age-related plasticity may, therefore, play a functionally-relevant role in preparing male bees for mating, and suggests that developmentally-driven neural restructuring can occur in males, even in species where it is absent in females.

scholarly journals The Exercising Brain: Changes in Functional Connectivity Induced by an Integrated Multimodal Cognitive and Whole-Body Coordination Training

2016 ◽  
Vol 2016 ◽  
pp. 1-11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Traute Demirakca ◽  
Vita Cardinale ◽  
Sven Dehn ◽  
Matthias Ruf ◽  
Gabriele Ende
Keyword(s):  
Functional Connectivity ◽  
Brain Plasticity ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Posterior Cingulate Cortex ◽  
Whole Body ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Coordination Training ◽  
Brain Changes ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Brain

This study investigated the impact of “life kinetik” training on brain plasticity in terms of an increased functional connectivity during resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI). The training is an integrated multimodal training that combines motor and cognitive aspects and challenges the brain by introducing new and unfamiliar coordinative tasks. Twenty-one subjects completed at least 11 one-hour-per-week “life kinetik” training sessions in 13 weeks as well as before and after rs-fMRI scans. Additionally, 11 control subjects with 2 rs-fMRI scans were included. The CONN toolbox was used to conduct several seed-to-voxel analyses. We searched for functional connectivity increases between brain regions expected to be involved in the exercises. Connections to brain regions representing parts of the default mode network, such as medial frontal cortex and posterior cingulate cortex, did not change. Significant connectivity alterations occurred between the visual cortex and parts of the superior parietal area (BA7). Premotor area and cingulate gyrus were also affected. We can conclude that the constant challenge of unfamiliar combinations of coordination tasks, combined with visual perception and working memory demands, seems to induce brain plasticity expressed in enhanced connectivity strength of brain regions due to coactivation.

scholarly journals Experience, but not age, is associated with volumetric mushroom body expansion in solitary alkali bees

2021 ◽  
pp. jeb.238899
Author(s):  
Mallory A. Hagadorn ◽  
Makenna M. Johnson ◽  
Adam R. Smith ◽  
Marc A. Seid ◽  
Karen M. Kapheim
Keyword(s):  
Structural Changes ◽  
Evolutionary Relationship ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Mushroom Bodies ◽  
Order Processing ◽  
Social Species ◽  
Evolution Of Sociality ◽  
Foraging Experience ◽  
Brain Changes ◽  
The Brain

In social insects, changes in behavior are often accompanied by structural changes in the brain. This neuroplasticity may come with experience (experience-dependent) or age (experience-expectant). Yet, the evolutionary relationship between neuroplasticity and sociality is unclear, because we know little about neuroplasticity in the solitary relatives of social species. We used confocal microscopy to measure brain changes in response to age and experience in a solitary halictid bee (Nomia melanderi). First, we compared the volume of individual brain regions among newly-emerged females, laboratory females deprived of reproductive and foraging experience, and free-flying, nesting females. Experience, but not age, led to significant expansion of the mushroom bodies—higher-order processing centers associated with learning and memory. Next, we investigated how social experience influences neuroplasticity by comparing the brains of females kept in the laboratory either alone or paired with another female. Paired females had significantly larger olfactory regions of the mushroom bodies. Together, these experimental results indicate that experience-dependent neuroplasticity is common to both solitary and social taxa, whereas experience-expectant neuroplasticity may be an adaptation to life in a social colony. Further, neuroplasticity in response to social chemical signals may have facilitated the evolution of sociality.

Aging

2019 ◽  
pp. 105-112
Author(s):  
Risto Näätänen ◽  
Teija Kujala ◽  
Gregory Light
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Speech Perception ◽  
Cognitive Decline ◽  
Temporal Processing ◽  
Brain Aging ◽  
Brain Plasticity ◽  
Part Of Speech ◽  
Memory Traces ◽  
Age Related ◽  
The Brain

This chapter shows that MMN and its magnetoencephalographic (MEG) equivalent MMNm are sensitive indices of aging-related perceptual and cognitive decline. Importantly, the age-related neural changes are associated with a decrease of general brain plasticity, i.e. that of the ability of the brain to form and maintain sensory-memory traces, a necessary basis for veridical perception and appropriate cognitive brain function. MMN/MMNm to change in stimulus duration is particularly affected by aging, suggesting the increased vulnerability of temporal processing to brain aging and accounting, for instance, for a large part of speech-perception difficulties of the aged beyond the age-related peripheral hearing loss.

Ageing and the human brain

2020 ◽  
pp. 170-182
Author(s):  
Verena Heise ◽  
Enikő Zsoldos ◽  
Klaus P. Ebmeier
Keyword(s):  
In Vivo Imaging ◽  
Allostatic Load ◽  
Public Health Medicine ◽  
Causal Factors ◽  
Stress Markers ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Brain Changes ◽  
Heuristic Device ◽  
The Brain

There is little doubt that the brain changes with time, and all research in psychiatry is predicated on holding age constant in comparing groups of patients or estimating the effect sizes of causal factors. Nevertheless, relatively little is known about the mechanisms that are responsible for translating time into ageing. This chapter tries, after an overview of the principal mechanisms involved in biological ageing, to summarize the age-related changes observable in brains in vivo and to demonstrate the types of investigations that may cast light on such mechanisms in the future. A useful heuristic device to order the multiple potential causes of ageing is the chronic stress–allostatic load model, widely employed in epidemiology, public health medicine, and health psychology. In vivo imaging provides a method to test the translation of intermediate stress markers, such as vascular risk, metabolic syndrome, or allostatic load, into predictors of age-related brain changes.

scholarly journals The NCX3 Isoform of the Na+/Ca2+ Exchanger Contributes to Neuroprotection Elicited by Ischemic Postconditioning

2010 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 362-370 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giuseppe Pignataro ◽  
Elga Esposito ◽  
Ornella Cuomo ◽  
Rossana Sirabella ◽  
Francesca Boscia ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Brain Regions ◽  
Ischemic Postconditioning ◽  
Intracerebroventricular Infusion ◽  
Ionic Transporters ◽  
Relevant Role ◽  
Ischemic Episode ◽  
Study Support ◽  
Interfering Rna ◽  
The Brain

It has been recently shown that a short sublethal brain ischemia subsequent to a prolonged harmful ischemic episode may confer ischemic neuroprotection, a phenomenon termed ischemic postconditioning. Na+/Ca2+ exchanger (NCX) isoforms, NCX1, NCX2, and NCX3, are plasma membrane ionic transporters widely distributed in the brain and involved in the control of Na+ and Ca2+ homeostasis and in the progression of stroke damage. The objective of this study was to evaluate the role of these three proteins in the postconditioning-induced neuroprotection. The NCX protein and mRNA expression was evaluated at different time points in the ischemic temporoparietal cortex of rats subjected to tMCAO alone or to tMCAO plus ischemic postconditioning. The results of this study showed that NCX3 protein and ncx3 mRNA were upregulated in those brain regions protected by postconditioning treatment. These changes in NCX3 expression were mediated by the phosphorylated form of the ubiquitously expressed serine/threonine protein kinase p-AKT, as the p-AKT inhibition prevented NCX3 upregulation. The relevant role of NCX3 during postconditioning was further confirmed by results showing that NCX3 silencing, induced by intracerebroventricular infusion of small interfering RNA (siRNA), partially reverted the postconditioning-induced neuroprotection. The results of this study support the idea that the enhancement of NCX3 expression and activity might represent a reasonable strategy to reduce the infarct extension after stroke.

scholarly journals Time-lagged associations between cognitive and cortical development from childhood to early adulthood

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eduardo Estrada ◽  
ROBERTO COLOM
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Ability ◽  
Developmental Psychology ◽  
Brain Plasticity ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Integration Theory ◽  
Childhood And Adolescence ◽  
Cognitive Changes ◽  
Cortical Structure ◽  
Age Related

[Paper in press. Accepted for publication in Developmental Psychology. Copyright by APA] Throughout childhood and adolescence, humans experience marked changes in cortical structure and cognitive ability. Cortical thickness and surface area, in particular, have been associated with cognitive ability. Here we ask the question: What are the time-related associations between cognitive changes and cortical structure maturation. Identifying a developmental sequence requires multiple measurements of these variables from the same individuals across time. This allows capturing relations among the variables and, thus, finding whether: (a) developmental cognitive changes follow cortical structure maturation, (b) cortical structure maturation follows cognitive changes, or (c) both processes influence each other over time. 430 children and adolescents (age range = 6.01 – 22.28 years) completed the WASI battery and were MRI scanned at three time points separated by ≈ 2 years (mean age t1 = 10.60, SD = 3.58, mean age t2=12.63, SD=3.62, mean age t3=14.49, SD=3.55). Latent Change Score (LCS) models were applied to quantify age-related relationships among the variables of interest. Our results indicate that cortical and cognitive changes related to each other reciprocally. Specifically, the magnitude or rate of the change in each variable at any occasion –and not the previous level– was predictive of later changes. These results were replicated for brain regions selected according to the coordinates identified in the Basten et al.’s (2015) meta-analysis, to the Parieto-Frontal Integration Theory (P-FIT, Jung & Haier, 2007) and to the whole cortex. Potential implications regarding brain plasticity and cognitive enhancement are discussed.

scholarly journals MRI of Capn15 knockout mice and analysis of Capn15 distribution reveal possible roles in brain development and plasticity

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Congyao Zha ◽  
Carole A Farah ◽  
Vladimir Fonov ◽  
David A. Rudko ◽  
Wayne S Sossin
Keyword(s):  
Brain Development ◽  
Knockout Mice ◽  
Brain Plasticity ◽  
Small Animal ◽  
Cell Types ◽  
Cysteine Proteases ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Conditional Knockout ◽  
Specific Cell ◽  
The Brain

AbstractPurposeThe non-classical Small Optic Lobe (SOL) family of calpains are intracellular cysteine proteases that are expressed in the nervous system and appear to play an important role in neuronal development in both Drosophila, where loss of this calpain leads to the eponymous small optic lobes, and in mouse and human, where loss of this calpain (Capn15) leads to eye anomalies. However, the brain regions where this calpain is expressed and the areas most affected by the loss of this calpain have not been carefully examined.ProceduresWe utilize an insert strain where lacZ is expressed under the control of the Capn15 promoter, together with immunocytochemistry with markers of specific cell types to address where Capn 15 is expressed in the brain. We use small animal MRI comparing WT, Capn15 knockout and Capn15 conditional knockout mice to address the brain regions that are affected when Capn 15 is not present, either in early development of the adult.ResultsCapn15 is expressed in diverse brain regions, many of them involved in plasticity such as the hippocampus, lateral amygdala and Purkinje neurons. Capn15 knockout mice have smaller brains, and present specific deficits in the thalamus and hippocampal regions. There are no deficits revealed by MRI in brain regions when Capn15 is knocked out after development.ConclusionsAreas where Capn15 is expressed in the adult are not good markers for the specific regions where the loss of Capn15 specifically affects brain development. Thus, it is likely that this calpain plays distinct roles in brain development and brain plasticity.

scholarly journals Aging triggers an upregulation of a multitude of cytokines in the male and especially the female rodent hippocampus but more discrete changes in other brain regions

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Latarsha Porcher ◽  
Sophie Bruckmeier ◽  
Steven D. Burbano ◽  
Julie E. Finnell ◽  
Nicole Gorny ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Tests ◽  
Ventral Hippocampus ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Cytokine Expression ◽  
Brown Norway ◽  
Mouse Strains ◽  
Gm Csf ◽  
Age Related ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Related Increase

Abstract Background Despite widespread acceptance that neuroinflammation contributes to age-related cognitive decline, studies comparing protein expression of cytokines in the young versus old brains are surprisingly limited in terms of the number of cytokines and brain regions studied. Complicating matters, discrepancies abound—particularly for interleukin 6 (IL-6)—possibly due to differences in sex, species/strain, and/or the brain regions studied. Methods As such, we clarified how cytokine expression changes with age by using a Bioplex and Western blot to measure multiple cytokines across several brain regions of both sexes, using 2 mouse strains bred in-house as well as rats obtained from NIA. Parametric and nonparametric statistical tests were used as appropriate. Results In the ventral hippocampus of C57BL/6J mice, we found age-related increases in IL-1α, IL-1β, IL-2, IL-3, IL-4, IL-6, IL-9, IL-10, IL-12p40, IL-12p70, IL-13, IL-17, eotaxin, G-CSF, interfeuron δ, KC, MIP-1a, MIP-1b, rantes, and TNFα that are generally more pronounced in females, but no age-related change in IL-5, MCP-1, or GM-CSF. We also find aging is uniquely associated with the emergence of a module (a.k.a. network) of 11 strongly intercorrelated cytokines, as well as an age-related shift from glycosylated to unglycosylated isoforms of IL-10 and IL-1β in the ventral hippocampus. Interestingly, age-related increases in extra-hippocampal cytokine expression are more discreet, with the prefrontal cortex, striatum, and cerebellum of male and female C57BL/6J mice demonstrating robust age-related increase in IL-6 expression but not IL-1β. Importantly, we found this widespread age-related increase in IL-6 also occurs in BALB/cJ mice and Brown Norway rats, demonstrating conservation across species and rearing environments. Conclusions Thus, age-related increases in cytokines are more pronounced in the hippocampus compared to other brain regions and can be more pronounced in females versus males depending on the brain region, genetic background, and cytokine examined.

scholarly journals Space-Dependent Glia–Neuron Interplay in the Hippocampus of Transgenic Models of β-Amyloid Deposition

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (24) ◽  
pp. 9441
Author(s):  
Daniele Lana ◽  
Filippo Ugolini ◽  
Maria Grazia Giovannini
Keyword(s):  
Brain Regions ◽  
Therapeutic Strategies ◽  
Differential Sensitivity ◽  
Transgenic Models ◽  
Age Related ◽  
Neurodegenerative Pathology ◽  
Spatial Differences ◽  
Key Factor ◽  
Β Amyloid ◽  
The Brain

This review is focused on the description and discussion of the alterations of astrocytes and microglia interplay in models of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). AD is an age-related neurodegenerative pathology with a slowly progressive and irreversible decline of cognitive functions. One of AD’s histopathological hallmarks is the deposition of amyloid beta (Aβ) plaques in the brain. Long regarded as a non-specific, mere consequence of AD pathology, activation of microglia and astrocytes is now considered a key factor in both initiation and progression of the disease, and suppression of astrogliosis exacerbates neuropathology. Reactive astrocytes and microglia overexpress many cytokines, chemokines, and signaling molecules that activate or damage neighboring cells and their mutual interplay can result in virtuous/vicious cycles which differ in different brain regions. Heterogeneity of glia, either between or within a particular brain region, is likely to be relevant in healthy conditions and disease processes. Differential crosstalk between astrocytes and microglia in CA1 and CA3 areas of the hippocampus can be responsible for the differential sensitivity of the two areas to insults. Understanding the spatial differences and roles of glia will allow us to assess how these interactions can influence the state and progression of the disease, and will be critical for identifying therapeutic strategies.

scholarly journals Beat Detection Recruits the Visual Cortex in Early Blind Subjects

Life ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 296
Author(s):  
Rodrigo Araneda ◽  
Sandra Silva Moura ◽  
Laurence Dricot ◽  
Anne G. De Volder
Keyword(s):  
Brain Plasticity ◽  
Brain Activity ◽  
Sensory Modality ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Rhythm Perception ◽  
Brain Areas ◽  
Sensory Modalities ◽  
Beat Detection ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Early Blindness

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, here we monitored the brain activity in 12 early blind subjects and 12 blindfolded control subjects, matched for age, gender and musical experience, during a beat detection task. Subjects were required to discriminate regular (“beat”) from irregular (“no beat”) rhythmic sequences composed of sounds or vibrotactile stimulations. In both sensory modalities, the brain activity differences between the two groups involved heteromodal brain regions including parietal and frontal cortical areas and occipital brain areas, that were recruited in the early blind group only. Accordingly, early blindness induced brain plasticity changes in the cerebral pathways involved in rhythm perception, with a participation of the visually deprived occipital brain areas whatever the sensory modality for input. We conclude that the visually deprived cortex switches its input modality from vision to audition and vibrotactile sense to perform this temporal processing task, supporting the concept of a metamodal, multisensory organization of this cortex.

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