Scientists see deep inside human brain Mar 1, 2008
Until now, scientists wanting to use brain scans to study brain chemicals like dopamine were relegated to watching its effects in other more accessible parts of the brain, like the prefrontal cortex and ventral striatum. However, this was downstream of its source, and therefore possibly much less accurate, D'Ardenne said. (MSNBC -- Health)
First Peek Into Deepest Recesses Of Human Brain Feb 29, 2008
Until now, scientists wanting to use brain scans to study brain chemicals like dopamine were relegated to watching its effects in other more accessible parts of the brain, like the prefrontal cortex and ventral striatum ... Horizontal (left) and vertical (right) slices of brain show increased blood flow (red region) in brainstem (VTA or ventral tegmental area) in measurements made by functional magnetic resonance imaging. (Science Daily)
Opiate And Nicotine Have Surprisingly Similar Effect On Brain's Reward System Feb 20, 2008
This research is important to scientists because it demonstrates overlap in the way the two drugs work, complementing previous studies that showed overlapping effects on physiology of the ventral tegmenal area, another key part of the brain's reward circuitry. The hope is that this study will help identify new methods for treating addiction -- and not just for one drug type. (Science Daily)
How The Heart Takes Form: Early Heart Development In Vertebrates Feb 12, 2008
This complex inversion of the right heart field generates the ventral floor, whereas the noninvoluting left heart field gives rise to the future roof of the heart tube. This process is steered by various genes, which also regulate the right/left asymmetry of vertebrates. (Science Daily)
Brain Circuitry That Drives Drug-seeking Compulsion Identified Feb 8, 2008
The researchers drew on previous studies indicating that when drug-seeking transforms from a goal-directed behavior to a compulsion, control over that behavior shifts from the ventral to dorsal region of the striatum. In their experiments, the researchers first trained rats to press a lever to obtain cocaine, which also activated a signal light. (Science Daily)
Laser surgery of zebrafish (Danio rerio) embryos using femtosecond laser pulses: Optimal parameters for exogenous material delivery, and the laser's effect on short- and long-term development Jan 30, 2008
Using light microscopy and scanning electron microscopy we compared key developmental features of laser-manipulated and control samples, including the olfactory pit, dorsal, ventral and pectoral fins, notochord, pectoral fin buds, otic capsule, otic vesicle, neuromast patterning, and kinocilia of the olfactory pit rim and cristae of the lateral wall of the ear. Conclusion. (BioMed Central)
Study sheds new light on women with anorexia Dec 26, 2007
In the healthy women, an area known as the anterior ventral striatum, associated with emotional rewards, showed much more activity than in the women recovering from anorexia. But the former anorexics had stronger responses in a brain region known as the caudate, which is associated with planning and calculating future consequences. (Herald Online, SC -- Health)
Anorexia cannot be picked up by looking at photographs of super ... Dec 17, 2007
Among the nonsufferers, the brain region connected to emotional responses the anterior ventral striatum showed strong differences between winning and losing the game. Among the women with a history of anorexia, however, there was little difference in activity between winning and losing. (Times Online)
What Your Brain Looks Like on Faith Dec 17, 2007
Regardless of their content, statements that the subjects believed lit up the ventral medial prefrontal cortex (VMPC), a location in the brain best known for processing reward, emotion and taste. Equally "primitive" areas associated with taste, pain perception and disgust determined disbelief. (Time.com)
Anorexia visible with brain scans Dec 2, 2007
While the brain region for emotional responses - the anterior ventral striatum - showed strong differences for winning and losing the game in the healthy women, women with a past history of anorexia showed little difference between winning and losing. Dr Kaye said that, in anorexia, this might impact on food enjoyment. (BBC News -- UK)
Brain patterns of former anorexics reveal clues to disorder's lasting impact Dec 1, 2007
Brain activity in the anterior ventral striatum and caudate regions were monitored during game play with fMRI brain imaging. The anterior ventral striatum is associated with instant emotional responses, while the caudate is involved in linking actions to outcome and planning. (EurekAlert!)
Men's brains 'light up' when they know they're earning more Nov 24, 2007
Neuroscientist Dr Bernd Weber explains: "One area in particular, the ventral striatum, is the region where part of what we call the 'reward system' is located. In this area, we observed an activation when the player completed his task correctly.". A wrong answer, and no payment, resulted in a reduction in blood flow to the "reward region". (BBC News -- Health)
Money Motivates -- Especially When Your Colleague Gets Less Nov 24, 2007
"One area in particular, the ventral striatum, is the region where part of what we call the 'reward system' is located." ... By contrast, when the subject got his estimate wrong, activity in his ventral striatum would subside ... For player two, on the other hand, the blood flow into the ventral striatum actually decreased " even though he had performed the task successfully and had been rewarded for his efforts. Men like competing "This result clearly contradicts traditional economic theory,"... (Science Daily)
Why Quitting Smoking Is So Difficult Nov 9, 2007
" Often, the depth of a person's addiction to nicotine can depend on their internal chemistry, says Jerry Stitzel, PhD, of the University of Colorado, who designed a study to evaluate the effects of nicotine over the course of a day. Stitzel's team examined three types of mice: one with a genetic mutation that limits the conversion of the brain chemical serotonin to melatonin, a hormone made in response to darkness; one that produces melatonin but lacks the proteins essential for the brain and... (Science Daily)
Why Teens Are Such Impulsive Risk-takers Nov 9, 2007
All participants displayed activity in areas in the brain called the amygdala, ventral striatum, and medial prefrontal cortex on trials when they received rewards, as compared with those when they did not. Each of those areas has been associated in previous studies with increased activity when people are rewarded. (Science Daily)
Sleep, And How Cocaine Changes The Brain To Make Treatment So Difficult Nov 8, 2007
Prior cocaine exposure had divergent effects on the processing of reward/punishment-predicting cues in the two striatal regions: It abolished neural activity evoked by these cues in the ventral striatum while marginally enhancing such activity in the dorsolateral striatum. "This somewhat surprising result suggests that rather than generally enhancing striatal processing of cues, consistent with a generalized effect on habit learning, prior cocaine exposure actually shifts the balance of striatal... (Science Daily)
Brain Chemicals Involved In Aggression Identified: May Lead To New Treatments Nov 8, 2007
" Scientists have long known that damage to certain regions of the brain, most notably the prefrontal cortex, can result in violent behavior. More recently, imaging studies have identified the neural circuits that become activated in the brains of normal, healthy individuals during moral decision-making. The analysis was undertaken to see if the brain regions compromised in antisocial populations include the newly identified brain regions involved in moral decision-making. Raine and his... (Science Daily)
Lessons Learned—Or Overlearned: It Makes All the Difference in How the Brain Copes Oct 23, 2007
This rise in BDNF concentration, the scientists say, results from increased activity of neurons in the ventral tegmental area, a midbrain structure that sends signals to the nucleus accumbens via the chemical messenger dopamine ... "Resilient mice overcome this change by counteradapting their gene expression [the suite of genes that act on the nucleus accumbens that are either turned on or off] to clamp down the levels of activity in the ventral tegmental area.". (Scientific American)
New heart anatomy for fruit flies Oct 23, 2007
Wasserthal wrote that the structures in the heart went overlooked because the anatomy is buried under a muscular sheath and fat body, making them invisible during ventral dissections. Additionally, they are delicate and tend to get damaged easily during dissection. (The Scientist)
Stress: Brain Yields Clues About Why Some Succumb While Others Prevail Oct 22, 2007
This is an excellent indicator that there are similar mechanisms in the human brain," said NIMH Director Thomas R. Insel, MD. Looking at a specific part of the brain, the researchers found differences in the rate of impulse-firing by cells that make the chemical messenger dopamine. Vulnerable mice had excessive rates of impulse-firing during stressful situations. But adaptive mice maintained normal rates of firing because of a protective mechanism -- a boost in activity of channels that allow... (Science Daily)
Cool under pressure? It's all in your head Oct 20, 2007
The researchers then looked at two of the brain's reward centres -- the ventral tegmental area and the nucleus accumbens -- to see if there were differences there. These areas are part of the reward circuit of the brain and also known to be involved in fear conditioning. (Globe and Mail -- Technology)
Why some of us handle stress better Oct 20, 2007
Thereafter, the researchers examined two areas of the brain that are associated with pleasure and reward, called the ventral tegmental area (VTA) and the nucleus accumbens (NAc). They found that mice that were more susceptible to social defeat showed increased levels of a growth factor known as brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) in the two brain regions, while rodents who coped better with the stress did not show the same chemical rise. (Times of India)
Vulnerability to Stress Linked to Brain Molecule Oct 20, 2007
The researchers then made detailed studies of two brain regions -- the ventral tegmental area (VTA) and the nucleus accumbens (NAcc), which are part of the brain's reward area that promotes acts that aid in survival. They found that the excess BNDF production in vulnerable mice occurred in the VTA but not the NAcc region. (MEDLINEplus)
E-911 board members should reconsider positions Oct 11, 2007
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Did human ancestors walk upright? Oct 11, 2007
This "horizontal septum" divides the body into a dorsal part (corresponding to the back side of humans), and a ventral part (or the front half). A strange birth defect in what may have been the first direct human ancestor led this septum to cross behind the spinal cord in the lumbar or lower back region-an odd configuration more typical of invertebrates. (MSNBC -- Environment)
One Shot Of Gene Therapy Spreads Through Brain In Animal Study Oct 11, 2007
In the current study, Wolfe targeted a particular region of the mouse brain called the ventral tegmental area (VTA), which has numerous connections with the rest of the brain. He used a neutralized virus called adeno-associated virus (AAV) as a vector--the delivery vehicle for the gene that carries coded instructions to produce the desired enzyme. (Science Daily)
New findings solve human origins mystery Oct 10, 2007
In most vertebrates (including most mammals), he explains, the dividing plane between the front (ventral) part of the body and the back (dorsal) part is a horizontal septum that runs in front of the spinal canal. This is a fundamental aspect of animal architecture. (EurekAlert!)
MicroRNAs in early patterning Aug 30, 2007
When a vertebrate egg is fertilized, the site of sperm entry the future dorsal/ventral axis of the embryo by driving -catenin signaling on the dorsal side ... Because miR-15 and miR-16 suppress Nodal signaling, their inhibition allows Nodal signaling to proceed on the dorsal side, while it is suppressed on the ventral side ... Although miR-15 and miR-16 clearly help differentiate the dorsal side from the ventral, "there are a lot of reinforcing mechanisms," he said. (The Scientist)
Abstinent Alcoholics Can Have Reduced Brain Activation Without Apparent Structural Damage Aug 30, 2007
Results showed that long-term memory retrieval induced by the task led to lower brain activity in the prefrontal lobes, anterior cingulate cortex, thalamus, and ventral striatum of the alcoholics than the controls. "Even though both groups of participants performed similarly on the task, what distinguished them were their brain activation levels while engaged in the memory task," said Sullivan. (Science Daily)
Brain scans pinpoint how chocoholics are hooked Aug 28, 2007
Three regions thought to be important in pleasure sensation and addictive behaviour - the orbitofrontal cortex, the ventral striatum and the cingulate cortex - were all more active in the chocolate fanciers. "We can tell what people will like from their brain response," said Prof Rolls. (Guardian Unlimited)
Music Moves Brain To Pay Attention, Study Finds Aug 6, 2007
An event change - the movement transition signaled by the termination of one movement, a brief pause, followed by the initiation of a new movement - activates the first network, called the ventral fronto-temporal network ... Having a mismatch between what listeners expect to hear vs. what they actually hear - for example, if an unrelated chord follows an ongoing harmony - triggers similar ventral regions of the brain. (Science Daily)
How Pain Distracts The Brain Jul 7, 2007
Reference: Bingel et al.: "fMRI Reveals How Pain Modulates Visual Object Processing in the Ventral Visual Stream." Publishing in Neuron 55, 157--167, July 5, 2007. DOI 10. (Science Daily)
Does Circumcision Remove The Most Sensitive Parts Of The Penis? Jun 29, 2007
The most sensitive location on the circumcised penis was the circumcision scar on the ventral surface. It was remarkable that five locations on the uncircumcised penis that are routinely removed at circumcision had lower pressure thresholds that the ventral scar of the circumcised penis. (Science Daily)
What makes us laugh -- and why? Jun 11, 2007
But either way, if people found the joke funny, it invariably activated the same "funny zone" in the brain: the medial ventral prefrontal cortex. The funnier they found the joke, the more that area of the brain lit up like a pinball machine. (San Francisco Chronicle -- Opinion)
Considering 'What Might Have Been' Is Key In Evaluating Behavior May 16, 2007
This effect manifested as a distinct selective activation signal in a part of the brain called the ventral caudate nucleus. The emotion of regret for a path chosen or not taken can be strongly influential on future decision-making. (Science Daily)
How Morphine Breaks the Brain's Brakes May Be Key to Breaking Addiction May 2, 2007
A team of Brown University scientists found that morphine disrupts an inhibitory mechanism in the ventral tegmental area (VTA), a cluster of neurons in the center of the brain responsible for processing naturally rewarding actions, such as eating and sexual activity. The resulting imbalance between excitation and inhibition allows the levels of the neurotransmitter dopamine, a pleasure chemical, to surge. (Scientific American)
New theory of addiction as a disease of learning and memory Apr 29, 2007
Kauer recorded the phenomenon in the ventral tegmental area, or VTA, a small section of the midbrain that is involved in the reward system that reinforces survival-boosting behaviors such as eating and sex , a reward system linked to addiction. The affected synapses, Kauer found, were those between inhibitory neurons and dopamine neurons. (News-Medical.net)
Erectile Function, Sexual Drive, And Ejaculatory Function Analyzed After Reconstructive Surgery Apr 29, 2007
The operations performed included bulbar excision and primary anastomosis (EPA; 23 of 52, 44%), dorsal or ventral buccal mucosa onlay reconstructions (22 of 52, 42%), and two-stage repairs using buccal mucosa (7 of 52, 14%). The mean stricture length was 4. (Science Daily)
Study: Hint Of Payoff Spurs Harder Work Apr 14, 2007
Those brain scans show that a certain brain area, the ventral pallidum, was particularly active during the test. The ventral pallidum is involved in motivation and reward, note Pessiglione and colleagues. (CBS News)
Selfish genes may drive out diseases Mar 30, 2007
When myd88 is silenced in ooctyes, embryos suffer ventral patterning defects and fail to hatch. The antidote consists of a myd88 replacement. (The Scientist)
Just as you suspected, teen brains not fully developed Mar 29, 2007
First, researchers at the University of Illinois in Champaign reported results from a study of adolescent rats that showed a substantial loss of neurons in the ventral prefrontal cortex, which is devoted to planning and social behavior. While earlier studies in people had shown there are gradual reductions in the volume of this part of the brain in adolescence, "the finding that neurons are actually dying is completely new," said Janice Juraska, a professor of psychology and lead investigator of... (Herald Online, SC -- Health)
Brain damage tied to moral judgments Mar 23, 2007
The term ventral means underneath and medial means near the middle ... "The difference was very clear, for all of the ventral medial patients," said Dr. Michael Koenigs, a neuroscientist at the National Institutes of Health who led the study while at the University of Iowa ... The ventral medial area integrates these signals with others from the cortex, including emotional memories, to help generate familiar social reactions. (International Herald Tribune -- Health)
Body Clock Disruption Brings on Manic Behavior Mar 22, 2007
Here, the scientists used a targeted virus to return a proper copy of Clock to cells in the ventral tegmental area, a midbrain region critical in the reward pathway involved in production of the pleasure system neurotransmitter dopamine. After the virus was introduced, the mutant mice began to act more like the control animals but were still a bit more hyper, McClung notes. (Scientific American)
Brain injury said to affect moral choices Mar 22, 2007
"Ventral" means "underneath," and "medial" means "near the middle." The area in adults is about the size of a large plum. People with this injury can be lucid, easygoing, talkative and intelligent, but socially awkward, seemingly numb to the ebb and flow of subtle social cues and emotions. (International Herald Tribune -- Health)
Smoking alters brain 'like drugs' Feb 25, 2007
The researchers from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (Nida) looked at samples of human brain tissue from the nucleus accumbens and the ventral midbrain - brain regions that play a part in controlling addictive behaviours. Eight samples were taken from people who had smoked until their deaths, eight from people who had smoked for up to 25 years before their death and eight non-smokers. (BBC News -- Health)
Influence Of The Menstrual Cycle On The Female Brain Feb 13, 2007
Result: when men anticipate rewards, they mainly activate a region involved in motivation for obtaining rewards, the ventral striatum, whereas in women, it is a region dealing with emotions, the amygdalo-hippocampal region, which is the most highly activated ... -- In mammals, the hypothalamus is a region of the brain located below the thalamus, forming the major portion of the ventral region of the diencephalon and functioning to regulate certain metabolic. (Science Daily)
Brain Scans: How Super Bowl Ads Fumbled Feb 6, 2007
Fewer than 20% of the ads, says Dr. Joshua Freedman, one of the neuroscientists involved in the study, triggered nerve activity in the ventral striatum, or the reward and satisfaction areas of the brain those areas that are known to be involved in making associations and forming connections with people or things ... The ads that elicited little response in the ventral striatum, according to the UCLA study, included Robert Goulet 's turn as an office gremlin for Emerald Nuts and Sprint 's... (Time.com)
Read more... Jan 31, 2007
Regions that become more active as the amount increases are considered "reward centers" in the brain, such as the prefrontal cortex and the ventral striatum, Poldrack said. The researchers also found that reward centers in the brain respond not only when we actually receive rewards but also when we make decisions about potential rewards, and that when we make decisions, the reward circuitry in the brain is more sensitive to possible losses than to possible gains. (PNN Online)
How the brain reacts to romance Jan 3, 2007
They found that feelings of intensive romantic love were linked to activity in the right caudate nucleus and right ventral tegmental areadopamine, which have high levels of dopamine activity. Gender differences. (BBC News -- Science)
High Dopamine Transporter Levels Not Correlated With ADHD Dec 29, 2006
The PET scans revealed that ADHD subjects had significantly fewer dopamine transporters than control subjects in the nucleus accumbens, an area of the ventral striatum that is one of the main reward centers in the brain. In a dorsal striatum region known as the putamen, which plays an important role in habits and is also involved with attention, dopamine transporter levels did not differ between the two groups. (Science Daily)
Deal Or No Deal? Need For Immediate Reward Linked To More Active Brain Region Dec 22, 2006
Not only do people differ in their preferences for immediate over delayed rewards of larger value, say the researchers in the Journal of Neuroscience, but these individual traits are mirrored by the level of activity in the ventral striatum, a key part of the brain's circuitry involved in mediating behavioral responses and physiological states associated with reward and pleasure. Research volunteers classified as more impulsive decision makers, who tend to seek rewards in the here and now, had... (Science Daily)
How we taste affects health and Thanksgiving menu Nov 23, 2006
Michigan researchers recently implanted electrodes into the brains of rats to track a pleasure-sensing region called the ventral pallidum. That region's cells fired in a frenzy when the rats ate a flavor, sweet or salt, that they craved, but slowly stopped as the rats got tired of eating the same old thing. (AZCentral -- News)
Study Challenges Belief That Tree Frogs Depress Metabolic Rate After 'Waxing' Themselves Oct 31, 2006
"This self-wiping is a complex behaviour involving the use of all four limbs to stroke or rub all dorsal and ventral body surfaces, including the limbs," explains Nadia A. Gomez (University of Florida, Gainesville) and her coauthors. They continue: "Thus, the animal is protected from dehydration, provided the external film of lipids is not physically disrupted by movements or other disturbance.". (Science Daily)
Groups And Grumps: Study Identifies 'Sociality' Neurons Oct 31, 2006
A University of California, San Diego study has for the first time identified brain cells that influence whether birds of a feather will, or will not, flock together. Various properties of vasotocin neurons differ between estrildid finch species that are relatively asocial and those that are more gregarious, such as this spice finch. (Science Daily)
Tastes great! Study shows brain's response to pleasing -- and changing -- tastes Oct 31, 2006
In a new paper in the November issue of the Journal of Neurophysiology, U-M neuroscientists and psychologists report the findings from direct monitoring of an area of the brain known as the ventral pallidum ... Their ventral pallidum brain activity was also much lower in response to the salt water ... The study was designed so that the signals from the ventral pallidum were only related to the "liking" or disliking of the taste, and not to a salt-seeking drive or movement. (EurekAlert!)
The Neurobiology Behind Why Eating Feels So Good Oct 20, 2006
These neurons produce dopamine and are located in a region of the brain known as the ventral tegmental area (VTA) ... -- In mammals, the hypothalamus is a region of the brain located below the thalamus, forming the major portion of the ventral region of the diencephalon and functioning to regulate certain metabolic. (Science Daily)
Eating addictive as sex, drugs: Study Oct 20, 2006
What Horvath found in rats was that the hormone ghrelin produced in the stomach to promote eating is actually acting on a part of the brain, the ventral tegmental area (VTA), that has long been associated with the pleasurable effects of things like drugs and sexual activity. Horvath, a veterinarian and neuroscientist, says an addiction mechanism to promote eating would have evolved naturally in our brains to ensure we took the trouble to find food. (Toronto Star -- Canada)
In early embryos, cilia get the message across Oct 20, 2006
Cilia on the outer surface of the embryo's underside, an area called the ventral node in mammals, exhibit a characteristic twirling movement that wafts chemical messengers over to the left side ... Oishi discovered that duboraya is required for formation of fully functional cilia in Kupffer's vesicle, the fish equivalent of the mammalian ventral node. (EurekAlert!)
Keys to Better Eating Are All in Your Head Oct 20, 2006
"These neurons produce dopamine and are located in a region of the brain known as the ventral tegmental area (VTA)," wrote the researchers, headed by Dr. Tamas Horvath of the Yale University School of Medicine in Connecticut. Horvath's team found that ghrelin, itself only discovered in the last decade, acts on a molecular structure on brain cells called the ghrelin receptor growth hormone secretagogue 1 receptor or GHSR for short. (Newsmax)
Pleasure and pain: Study shows brain's 'pleasure chemical' is involved in response to pain too Oct 19, 2006
The authors concluded that in some areas of the basal ganglia, dopamine was involved in the assessment of pain itself, while in the ventral area, or nucleus accumbens, it was related to the emotional experience of pain ... D., a graduate student at MBNI. "The dopamine system in the ventral basal ganglia may represent an important point of interaction between the neurobiologies of emotion, reward and pain regulation. The new findings build on previous pain research by Zubieta and his team, which... (EurekAlert!)
Discovery of post-stimulus activated release implies new mechanisms for dopamine release Oct 16, 2006
In their studies, they have observed that dopamine levels remain above the baseline long after neurons had been stimulated from five to 20 minutes in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) and 40 to 100 minutes in the nucleus accumbens and prefrontal cortex ... Yet this active transport system is not abundant in the ventral striatum and prefrontal cortex areas, leading researchers to think that perhaps the dopamine levels remained elevated due to an excess that had yet to be absorbed. (EurekAlert!)
Leptin Has Powerful Effect On Reward Center In The Brain Sep 30, 2006
"Finding that metabolic hormones directly regulate the ventral tegmental area (VTA) of the mid-brain has profound implications for how researchers view the integration of metabolic signals in the brain," said the senior author, Ralph DiLeone, assistant professor of psychiatry ... -- In mammals, the hypothalamus is a region of the brain located below the thalamus, forming the major portion of the ventral region of the diencephalon and functioning to regulate certain metabolic. (Science Daily)
Study offers clues to brain's protective mechanisms against alcoholism Sep 5, 2006
These areas of the brain -- including the caudate and ventral striatum -- are involved in emotional reactions to stress and cognitive control of decisions about drinking. "This suggests that dopamine D2 receptors in these brain regions protect high-risk individuals from becoming alcoholic," said principal investigator Gene-Jack Wang, who chairs Brookhaven Lab's Medical Department and is clinical head of the PET Imaging Group at the Lab's Center for Translational Neuroimaging. (EurekAlert!)
Shared ancestor to humans, present-day non-human primates may be linchpin in evolution of language Jul 24, 2006
Moreover, these regions correspond to the key language centers in humans, with the ventral premotor cortex (PMv) corresponding to Broca's area, and the temporoparietal area (Tpt) and posterior parietal cortex (PPC) corresponding to Wernicke's area. In contrast, the non-biological sounds which were acoustically similar to the coos and screams but had no meaning for the animals elicited significantly less activity in these regions; rather, they were associated with greater activation of the... (EurekAlert!)
Stem Cell Therapy Restores Walking Function to Paralyzed Rats Jun 23, 2006
The stem cells were delivered into the spinal cords of the adult rats 28 days after they had become paralyzed following infection with the selective ventral motor neuron depleting virus Neuroadapted Sindbis virus (NSV). In one group of animals, the authors also injected into sciatic nerves glial cell derived neurotrophic factor (GDNF) as an attractant to help guide the nurtured embryonic cells into forming functional neuronal pathways, and they gave the animals cyclosporine to prevent rejection... (MedPage Today)
