Does your dog have social skills?

A study suggests that viewing the owner’s face works as a positive social reinforcement for dogs. Learn more about this and other surprising results about “man’s best friend”.

The contribution of nucleus accumbens in anxiety

In the scope of the research project 175/20 - The role of nucleus accumbens in the perception of natural rewards, led by Carina Cunha and supported by the BIAL Foundation, it was published the paper Involvement of nucleus accumbens D2–medium spiny neurons projecting to the ventral pallidum in anxiety-like behaviour in the Journal of Psychiatry & Neuroscience. In this study, the contribution of a specific population of dopaminergic neurons in a central nucleus for emotional behaviors is highlighted, now in the context of anxiety.

Connectivity between premotor and motor cortex impacts inter-areal communication

The paper Changing connectivity between premotor and motor cortex changes inter-areal communication in the human brain was published in the journal Progress in Neurobiology in the scope of the research project 44/16 - Inducing and measuring plasticity in response control mechanisms in the human brain, supported by the BIAL Foundation and led by Alejandra Sel de Felipe. It has been suggested that the efficacy or strength of connections between neuronal groups influences the communication strength between brain regions. The research team tested this possibility in the human brain by using manipulations that have been established to either increase or decrease connectivity strength in a human cortico-cortical pathway, the route connecting ventral premotor cortex (PMv) and primary motor cortex (M1) and demonstrated that changing short-term synaptic efficacy of the PMv-M1 pathway changes interregional brain communication between the premotor and the primary motor control regions. Moreover, increasing PMv-M1 coupling strength leads to increased beta and alpha coherence, while decreasing PMv-M1 coupling strength results in decreased theta coherence.

Are near-death experiences (NDEs) and psychedelic experiences alike?

Pascal Michael and colleagues aimed to analyse the similarities and differences between an NDE while in a coma and the experience induced by an endogenous psychedelic drug (5-Methoxy-DMT). There was a very high level of comparability between the original NDE and psychedelic experience in general, emerging common themes, such as, space-time transcendence, ego dissolution, cosmic love. However, there were also a few unique themes (life review, meeting deceased loved one, and threshold of no-return) that emerged in the NDE and were not present in the psychedelic experience. Despite the convergences observed in several domains, according to the participant’s subjective appraisal both experiences are almost completely different. To know more about this study, read the paper This is your brain on death: a comparative analysis of a near-death experience and subsequent 5-Methoxy-DMT experience published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, in the scope of the research project 359/18 - DMT and Epileptiform activity as an integrative model of the Near-Death Experience: A phenomenological, psychometric and psychophysiological study, supported by the BIAL Foundation.