Neuroscience

Stanford scientists identified brain circuitry that plays a role in the mysterious experience called dissociation, in which people can feel disconnected from their bodies and reality.

Lim, a clinician, surgeon and researcher at Johns Hopkins who has focused largely on immunotherapy for brain tumors, will succeed Gary Steinberg as chair of the department, starting Sept. 1.

The Stanford-based center’s affiliated faculty and staff, aided by more than 400 volunteers, conduct research on Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases and related disorders.

MRI brain scans show subtle changes consistent with inflammation in a severe childhood disease in which the immune system is thought to attack the brain, Stanford researchers found.

Cerebrospinal fluid levels of a hormone called vasopressin were lower in babies who went on to develop autism than in those who did not, a study found.

The researchers also identified a molecular pathway involved in turning back the clock on the cells. Drugs that could manipulate the pathway might be an effective substitute for exercise, they suggest.

Stanford Medicine researchers have found a gene variant that protects carriers of another gene variant, ApoE4, from developing Alzheimer’s disease — the first demonstration of that beneficial effect.

A Stanford researcher and two collaborators conducted an extensive review of Alcoholics Anonymous studies and found that the fellowship helps more people achieve sobriety than therapy does.

Researchers used electroencephalography and artificial intelligence to identify individuals who would likely respond to sertraline, the antidepressant marketed as Zoloft.

Protein levels in people’s blood can predict their age, a Stanford study has found. The study also found that aging isn’t a smoothly continuous process.

Transient bursts of high-frequency electrical activity in epileptic brain tissue can impair cognition even when no seizure is occurring, Stanford scientists have found.