Genes & Molecules

How Genetic Studies Can Help Us Develop Treatments for Mental Illness

The drugs prescribed to treat symptoms of schizophrenia haven’t changed much in the last half-century. Now, advances in genetic studies could help scientists develop new — and better — treatments.

BrainFacts/SfN

Your selections: Genes and Molecules

Targeting Sonic Hedgehog Protein May Help Parkinson's Patients

Diminished levels of the protein cause a common side effect of Parkinson's treatment.

BrainFacts/SfN

Discovering Dopamine’s Role in Reward Prediction Error

How neuroscientists elucidated the neural underpinnings that link learning and reward.

BrainFacts/SfN

How Light Exposure Affects Your Sleep Schedule

Access to artificial light allows us to shift our sleep and wake cycles away from the natural daylight schedule.

BrainFacts/SfN

Stressed Dads Can Pass on Heightened Stress Vulnerability to Kids

A new study in mice shows chronic stress reprograms gene expression in sperm.

BrainFacts/SfN

How the Blind Cavefish Lost Its Sight

After evolution silenced some of its genes, the Mexican cavefish lost its eyeballs.

BrainFacts/SfN

Pain Pathways Guide Researchers Toward a Safer Morphine

Researchers seek to stop pain in its tracks.

BrainFacts/SfN

The Search for the Engram: Where Memory Lives in the Brain

For more than 100 years, neuroscientists have searched for memory’s physical form. Finding it would answer philosophical and scientific questions about our minds.