d-serine is a co-agonist of the N-methyl d-aspartate (NMDA) receptor, an important modulator of glutamatergic excitatory synaptic transmission. We previously reported that oral d-serine ingestion inhibited the intake of highly preferred food and promoted the intake of less preferred food in mice. Here, we analyzed the effects of intraperitoneal (IP) d-serine injections on feeding behavior in mi...

Taste quality and palatability are two of the most important properties measured in the evaluation of taste stimuli. Human panels can report both aspects, but are of limited experimental flexibility and throughput capacity. Relatively efficient animal models for taste evaluation have been developed, but each of them is designed to measure either taste quality or palatability as independent expe...

BACKGROUND Pathogenic aneuploidies involve the concept of dosage-sensitive genes leading to over- and underexpression phenotypes. Monosomy 21 in human leads to mental retardation and skeletal, immune and respiratory function disturbances. Most of the human condition corresponds to partial monosomies suggesting that critical haploinsufficient genes may be responsible for the phenotypes. The DYRK...

OBJECTIVE We studied whether repetitive intracardiac shock discharges of implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICDs) provoke an enduring enhancement of startle responses. METHODS The study population comprised 134 patients with an ICD. Among those, 67 patients had experienced shock delivery. Thirty-five patients had received five or more shocks. We used the startle reflex paradigm, which c...

BACKGROUND Despite evidence suggesting inaccuracy in the default fittings provided by hearing aid manufacturers, the use of probe-microphone measures for the verification of fitting accuracy is routinely used by fewer than half of practicing audiologists. PURPOSE The present study examined whether self-perception of hearing aid benefit, as measured through the Abbreviated Profile of Hearing A...

Background: Pain involves different brain regions and is critically determined by emotional processing. Among other areas, the rostral anterior cingulate cortex (rACC) is implicated in the processing of affective pain. Drugs that interfere with the endocannabinoid system are alternatives for the management of clinical pain. Cannabidiol (CBD), a phytocannabinoid found in Cannabis sativa, has bee...

Although pain is familiar to almost everyone, its precise definition continues to be elusive. Pain is most often viewed in the realm of somatosensation. However, this conceptualization is problematic as unlikemost other sensations that are usually affectively neutral, pain has the additional quality of aversiveness. To focus only on aversive qualities is also problematic as there are many avers...

Freudian (1905 Wien; Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewu�ten. Deuticke) and Salience (Goldstein, Suls and Anthony, 1972; The Psychology of Humor. Academic Press, New York) theory make opposite predictions about the effects of attitudes to sex and sexual behaviour on appreciation of sex humour. Male and female students (N=115) answered a questionnaire of attitudes toward sex, a sexual behavi...

Combining Behavior and Biology This conference has underscored the magnitude and complexity of the obesity problem across the globe (1). Efforts to effectively prevent and treat obesity must be grounded in a precise understanding of etiology and pathophysiology. Although the fundamental energy imbalance is well known, the myriad of factors that affect that imbalance are less well understood (2)...

In a recent issue of Biological Psychiatry, Ersche et al. (2014) published an interesting study on disgust sensitivity in Cocaine-dependent men. The authors of this research have explored the immunomodulatory effects of cocaine in disgust sensitivity, which is considered an important psychological mechanism of protection against the exposure to pathogens. Therefore, these researchers used neutr...