Like Goldilocks, the brain seeks proportions that are just right. The proper number of synapses or communication between nerve cells, determined early in life, is crucial to having a healthy brain ...

Healthy adult brains are endowed with a vast number of synapses, structures that relay signals across nerve cells to enable communications, information processing and storage throughout the nervous ...

What causes synapses to wither in neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s? Some researchers blame reactivation of microglia, which prune unneeded synapses during brain development. At the ...

In the central nervous system (CNS), the neurotrophins nerve growth factor (NGF), brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), neurotrophin 3 (NT3) and neurotrophin 4 (NT4) were initially characterized ...

Balanced development of excitatory and inhibitory synapses is required for normal brain function, and an imbalance in this development may underlie the pathogenesis of many neuropsychiatric disorders.

When it comes to the brain, "more is better" seems like an obvious assumption. But in the case of synapses, which are the connections between brain cells, too many or too few can both disrupt brain ...

Neurobiologists have uncovered the long-sought-after mechanisms behind the maintenance and decline of key synapses implicated in brain disorders such as Alzheimer's disease. The researchers identified ...