Medical Xpress news

Medical Xpress / Brain chemistry can reactivate or suppress dormant HIV

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infections are still fairly common and an estimated 40 million people worldwide are currently living with this condition. The HIV virus attacks the body's immune system and thus makes those ...

Dec 23, 2025 in HIV & AIDS
Medical Xpress / Stiffer colon could signal risk of early-onset colorectal cancer

Increased stiffness of the colon, spurred by chronic inflammation, may encourage the development and progression of early-onset colorectal cancer (CRC), a study co-led by UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers suggests. ...

Dec 23, 2025 in Oncology & Cancer
Medical Xpress / Not thinking about anything: Toward a brain signature of mind blanking

When we are awake, we seem to experience a continuous stream of sensations, reflections, memories, and impressions that make up our mental life. Yet some people report moments when they think about nothing at all. Is that ...

Dec 23, 2025 in Psychology & Psychiatry
Medical Xpress / Humans could have as many as 33 senses

Stuck in front of our screens all day, we often ignore our senses beyond sound and vision. And yet they are always at work. When we're more alert, we feel the rough and smooth surfaces of objects, the stiffness in our shoulders, ...

Dec 23, 2025 in Psychology & Psychiatry
Medical Xpress / Visual awareness study unlocks interplay between attention and consciousness

A new study led by Dr. Jiang Yi from the Institute of Psychology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has revealed the first clear evidence that visual awareness acts as a "conductor" that refines the speed, precision, and ...

Dec 23, 2025 in Psychology & Psychiatry
Medical Xpress / Night shifts aren't just tiring, they can be deadly: Disrupted sleep cycles linked to aggressive breast cancer

Working the night shift, frequently flying across time zones or keeping an irregular sleep schedule does more than just leave us exhausted; it can fuel the risk of aggressive breast cancer. Exactly how and why this happens ...

Dec 23, 2025 in Oncology & Cancer
Medical Xpress / To flexibly organize thought, the brain makes use of space

Our thoughts are specified by our knowledge and plans, yet our cognition can also be fast and flexible in handling new information. How does the well-controlled and yet highly nimble nature of cognition emerge from the brain's ...

Dec 23, 2025 in Neuroscience
Medical Xpress / Scientists grow mini brains to uncover cells behind autism-related brain overgrowth

A new study in the lab of Jason Stein, Ph.D., modeled brain development in a dish to identify cells and genes that influence infant brain growth, a trait associated with autism.

Dec 23, 2025 in Autism spectrum disorders
Medical Xpress / 'Listening in' on the brain's hidden language: Engineered protein detects the faintest incoming signals

Scientists have engineered a protein able to record the incoming chemical signals of brain cells (as opposed to just their outgoing signals). These whisper-quiet incoming messages are the release of the neurotransmitter glutamate, ...

Dec 23, 2025 in Neuroscience
Medical Xpress / Fathers' microplastics exposure tied to their children's metabolic problems

A study led by biomedical scientists at the University of California, Riverside, has shown for the first time that a father's exposure to microplastics (MPs) can trigger metabolic dysfunctions in his offspring. The research, ...

Dec 23, 2025 in Genetics
Medical Xpress / New ALS drug stabilizes decline with a trend toward improved strength and mobility for some

Historically, people with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) experience a relentless decline in neurological function that eventually robs them of the ability to move, speak, eat or breathe. Now, researchers from Washington ...

Dec 23, 2025 in Neuroscience
Medical Xpress / Brain's 'pulse generators' grow and shrink as memories are formed, study finds

Memories and learning processes are based on changes in the brain's neuronal connections, and as a result, in signal transmission between neurons.

Dec 23, 2025 in Neuroscience