10.13.2004
Sports, Reaction Time, and Memory
credit: kurt rogers/sfchronicle
Can improving your focus help you in other ways besides staving off memory loss? Probably, scientists are at work on new techniques for performance enhancement. Some of these I have alluded to in recent posts. (read below)
For a dramatic, albeit anecdotal example, take a look at the resurgent Cal Bears football team. The team's coach, Jeff Tedford, uses a unique reverse-checkers speed game to teach quarterbacks how to read defenses and react quickly. You can read about it in the San Francisco Chronicle, a Hearst newspaper.
What have the results been - a number 8 national ranking, plus, a near-upset of the USC Trojans, ranked #1. More pointedly, Tedford's latest prodigy, Aaron Rodgers, completed 23 straight passes into the teeth of the defense. Look out Cardinal, um, Indians.
But, maybe not so anecodotal. Using our software a well-known major league baseball player in the southland pulled off one of his best seasons, likewise, a Wimbledon tennis pro. We'll keep you posted.
U.S.Government to launch Alzheimer's study
A National study on Mild Cognitive Impairment was announced. The more insight and understanding that can be gained from early stage detection of memory loss, the better. This study will involve using MRI and other measures, a technique that Cognitive Labs has utilized at UC-Irvine previously in a pilot study.
WASHINGTON (AP) — About 800 older Americans will be asked to lend their brains to science this spring, part of a major government study to track early Alzheimer's disease.
Researchers will use brain-scanning MRIs and other tests to track people who have either early stage Alzheimer's or a milder type of memory loss known as "mild cognitive impairment." Over several years, they'll compare biological changes deep within those patients' brains to the aging that takes place in the brains of cognitively healthy seniors.
The goal is to find early warning signs that can identify people at highest risk of developing Alzheimer's, and markers to help test the effectiveness of new therapies faster than can be done today.
Plans for the $60 million, five-year study were to be unveiled Wednesday by the National Institute on Aging. While mostly funded by the government, about a third of the study's financing will come from pharmaceutical companies and the nonprofit Alzheimer's Association.
In April, researchers will begin recruiting 55- to 90-year-olds — some healthy, some with MCI, some with Alzheimer's — to participate in the study.
WASHINGTON (AP) — About 800 older Americans will be asked to lend their brains to science this spring, part of a major government study to track early Alzheimer's disease.
Researchers will use brain-scanning MRIs and other tests to track people who have either early stage Alzheimer's or a milder type of memory loss known as "mild cognitive impairment." Over several years, they'll compare biological changes deep within those patients' brains to the aging that takes place in the brains of cognitively healthy seniors.
The goal is to find early warning signs that can identify people at highest risk of developing Alzheimer's, and markers to help test the effectiveness of new therapies faster than can be done today.
Plans for the $60 million, five-year study were to be unveiled Wednesday by the National Institute on Aging. While mostly funded by the government, about a third of the study's financing will come from pharmaceutical companies and the nonprofit Alzheimer's Association.
In April, researchers will begin recruiting 55- to 90-year-olds — some healthy, some with MCI, some with Alzheimer's — to participate in the study.
