Cognitive Labs

James Watson co-discoverer of the nature of DNA with Francis Crick

Since it was learned that the APOEe4 variant of the APOE gene results in an increased risk of Alzheimer's - particularly so in the homogeneous 4/4 type, with risk between 10-20X the norm, there has been a debate focused on whether or not 'finding out' something so personal was worth it. In fact, one of the codebusters of the human genome, Dr. James Watson, has stated that he was not interested in finding out about APOE risk - however many other scientists, business leaders, and visionaries have publicly stated their desire to know.

Casting fresh light on the situation, a new study based at Boston University evaluating the psychological impact of "knowing" about propensity shows that it might be better to have this knowledge than to remain ignorant - and that people are equipped to handle the truth.

After all, if people are not continually striving, like Prometheus, to advance knowledge - than progress stalls and humanity's increasing cognitive ability - all of which has occurred during the last 1 millisecond of the cosmic clock when abstract thinking arose and was appended to tool-development (consider Lascaux and on petroglyphs) - may stop.

Labels: apoee4, boston, codebusters, watson

Scientists in Vienna presented research linking a secondary gene, TOMM40, to Alzheimer's causation along with APOEe4. APOEe4 is responsible for up to 50% of the genetic factor of Alzheimer's,and along with TOMM40, it is theorized that up to 90% of genetic incidence may be accounted for.

Labels: apoee4, tomm40

Researchers at Oxford University have found that people with the APOEe4 gene variant (According to Reuters-up to 25% of the population) have more active brains than those without this specific marker.



When APOEe4-positive individuals are administered an MRI scan and given memory tasks to work on, the hippocampal area displays more activity than those who are APOE 2 or APOE3.

As the Reuters report suggests, this combination offers the potential of being able to indicate beforehand subjects could be candidates for Alzheimer's Disease.

Cognitive Labs research shows that specific Internet-based exercises may be sensitive enough to detect the early preconditions of decline, even without the expense of an MRI, through a double-blind study of APOE4 and non APOE subjects completed at Stanford (published in 2008). Think of it like getting a news alert on a defined-keyword that you set up, pertaining to your brain, genetics, and cognitive health.

Labels: apoee4, cognitive, labs, oxford, stanford

This mural displays...

(1) The location of APOE on the 19th chromosome, out of 23 possible positions.
(2) The migration of modern humans from Africa
(3) The beginning of art and consciousness
(4) A scientific look at fixing the APOEe4 'bug'

Around 200,000 years is shown. Interestingly, those most prone to APOE 4/4 are descendants of migratory individuals who left Africa after the common ancestor-whose echoes remain in the DNA of everyone on Earth today, was born.

Consciousness is somewhat more complex. Some experts believed early burial including Neanderthals from locations like Shanidar Cave in the Zagros Mountains with significant pollen deposits mixed into the matrix are evidence that ceremonial flowers (maybe even leis, aloha) were tossed into the grave and point to consciousness and spiritualism. Others point to drawings of dot-fields as signs of spiritualism or shamanism (maybe ancient wo/man was consuming plant concoctions and this led to a spiritual dawn). Another group points to depictions of stick figures, and others rely on the full-blown dramatic inverted realism of Lascaux Cave, with beautiful renderings of grazing animals, as signs of thinking the imponderable.

Regardless, cognitive decline shuts down the brain prematurely, and one of the vectors is the genetic risk factor. Modern life, too, may be a culprit.

Labels: 19th, 23, apoee4, chomosome, concoctions, lascaux, shanidar

Cognitive Labs has acquired another Internet URL (joining brain.com) and will be launching an additional site focused on science, research, and distribution of our API's into various sectors of the publishing world. Users will be the editors and can decide how much they want to deploy the technology.

Hint: This website will leverage our published research (Stanford) relating to the APOEe4 genetic marker for Alzheimer's. Even WebMD acknowledges that 'genetics' is the number 2 factor in Alzheimer's risk, after age. Being proactive and managing your own information is really what the future of health is about.

Here is a Medline reference.

Labels: apoee3, apoee4, cognometer

An athlete at rest

A chronic reduction in blood sugar to the brain is suspected of instigating some types of Alzheimer's, according to new research by scientists at Northwestern. Blood sugar level is impacted by both blood flow (not enough flow or slow highly viscous blood) and also some conditions like diabetes.

When the amount of metabolized sugars delivered to the brain for energy is reduced, the brain reacts by redirecting resources. The protein e1F2alpha changes, causing a boost in production of an enzyme that switches on the development of the protein masses that in turn discourage additional blood flow and energy to the brain.

In this scenario Alzheimer's represents the toxic byproduct of this runaway, degrading resource management process that ultimately dampens all neuron activity.

"The finding is significant because it suggests that improving blood flow to the brain might be an effective approach to prevent or delay Alzheimer's," said Dr. Robert Vassar, principal investigator of the study being published in the journal Neuron.

Take action now by exercising.

It might not be a coincidence that the Industrial Age, modern epidemic of Alzheimer's was not diagnosed until 1906, when Alois Alzheimer gave a speech describing the development of tiny protein filaments in the brain of one of his former patients with memory loss.

Change of lifestyle characterized by industrial machine labor and office work coupled with the rise of the automobile and mass transit and a corresponding decline in human-powered agrarian farmwork has significantly reduced regular cardiovascular exercise for adults.

This is indeed strange when exercise appears to be the best and most efficient way to enhance blood flow and circulation, maintain and boost healthy capillary action through the body, and to evenly deliver energy via the blood serum.

It may be that we are polluting our brains with sedentarism, creating structures which are the equivalent of cognitive toxic waste dumps. You'll notice that the modern form of Alzheimer's was much less prevalent prior to 1900 than it is now.

The brain appears to handle lowered blood sugar as a famine indicator, and reacts with a short-term energy solution that has highly negative consequences.

No allowance or protocol seems to exist in the body's engineering to attribute this condition to lethargy brought on by an excess of plenty. With APOEe4 individuals, this protein combination appears to offer greater famine resistance as an adaptation to the harsh environment, but again has negative consequences.

So what can you do? Exercise your brain and BODY. This seems to be abundantly clear now. APOEe4 offers an even greater risk than normal in modern society.

If you think about it, a whole array of teleologically fascinating eschatological questions arise. For example, major figures in humanity's history can be viewed as either increasing or decreasing the risk vectors leading to Alzheimer's based on their social and policy decisions. Untethering human workers from the land, while a 20th century blessing, might increase the risk for post-modern Alzheimer's disease. Offering widespread employment in urban centers has the same effect-more Alzheimer's risk.

Our sociology and population ecology is inextricably linked to our health in ways that we have not commonly foreseen, and the rationally objective knowledge worker/ researcher/technical caste, those carrying the Promethean torch of science, might be oddly myopic and partially blind to this risk.



Other related CogLabs links:


Evolution in Just a Few Minutes (Flash Movie)

APOEe4 Test Subjects Exhibit Lack of Brain Connectity

APOE May be Associated with Unsuccessful Aging :-)?

Cognitive Labs Gene Research Published (paper format)

Labels: apoee4, blood, northwestern, sugar, vassar

A paper on APOEe4, a genetic indicator of increased Alzheimer's propensity, cognitive speed, and the Cognitive Labs technology has been published in paper format.

The reference is here

O'hara R, Sommer B, Way N, Kraemer HC, Taylor J, Murphy G "Slower speed-of-processing of cognitive tasks is associated with presence of the apolipoprotein epsilon4 allele." Journal of Psychiatric Research, (2008)February; 42(3) 199-204

Previously it existed in as an e-publication (2007)

Labels: apoe, apoee4, cognitive, Cognitive Labs, genes, o'hara

A study of APOE3 and 4 gene carriers compared with APOE2 and 3 found a greater incidence of mortality in the former amongst a population in Sicily.

The researchers suggest that APOEe4 therefore, can be linked with "early, unsuccessful aging" and present Down Syndrome as a model for this declination of longevity. By studying Down Syndrome carefully, more insight can be gathered into how APOEe4 cuts short longevity. It's suggested that vascular problems play a role along with higher incidence of Alzheimer's Disease.

Labels: alzheimers, apoee4, down, DS, infraction, mycardial

Low Bandwidth gets a new meaning.

One of the studies presented at the International Alzheimer's Association Conference was fascinating - asymptomatic APOEe4 positive people - the most reliable genetic indicator of Alzheimer's susceptibility yet identified - seem to have connectivity issues between the hippocampus and posterior cingulated cortex, according to researchers at the Medical College of Wisconsin.

A new MRI technique being developed by Shi Jiang Li and colleagues and tested on 28 subjects, 12 APOEe4 positive, showed that the non APOEe4 group exhibited 65% better connectivity than the APOEe4 group by measuring response across the brain from a resting state.

This correlates rather well with Dr. O'Hara's paper involving the Cognitive Labs tests/games, where APOEe4 individuals were found overall to have lower scales of performance. Fortunately, it's much easier to take our test than to get an MRI. Can you imagine how expensive it would be for 7.4 million MRI sessions to be administered? With no paperwork and bureaucracy allowance (this is an unreal assumption) the cost would be at least $7 billion, and possibly $15-$20 billion, fully allocated.

Now you can take self-assessment in your own hands by putting this sensitive technology on your own website, if you want - it's still free, for now. The upside - a public good, is potentially in the billions per year.

Learning about your own body and mind - before problems and accumulated wear and tear impair performance, can lead to being proactive about your lifestyle, which at present is the best way to stay healthy physically and cognitively.

Labels: apoee4, brain, Jiang, Ohara, Shi, Wisconsin

Gladstone Institute at UCSF and University of Texas researchers have found the APOEe4 genetic marker, known as the most significant genetic risk determinant of Alzheimer's Disease and a factor in heart disease and stroke, also may play a role in the severity of HIV in people who have the disease. Results were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

A seemingly trifling sequence difference of just one amino acid has profound implications for the structure and function of the APoE4 protein. ApoE4 has an extra intra-molecular bond that results in a more compact structure, and it also is more likely to be unstable, linked to its deleterious effects. Although the apoE3 gene is the most prevalent in all human populations, with frequencies of 50%, the genetic variant that leads to production of apoE4 is also widely distributed; its prevalence is 15.% (Some sources estimate at 20% or more of all humans)

Those with two copies of APOEe4, the homogeneous zygote, had a much more rapid progressions of HIV, leading to death, than those with two copies APOEe3.

The APOEe4 protein is smaller and more compact, but more unstable - than the APOEe2 and APOEe3. The reason for the APOEe4 mutation, it is hypothesized, helped people metabolize a lean, scarce diet and avoid starvation and possibly lowered the chance of child mortality. It also may be linked to colder temperatures, or possibly to those groups with the mutation who migrated into northern latitudes - it is more prevalent in Finland as a percentage of the population than anywhere else on earth, and also amongst relatively homogeneous ethnic groups (for example, German Russians) where increased APOEe4 risk has followed such groups even after migrating to North America where it is seen in distinct family histories of Alzheimer's Disease.

Labels: apoe, apoee3, apoee4, gladstone, homogeneous, texas, ucsf, zygote

Real time DNA replication is featured in the following visualization video...Fascinating. Then test your brain

Labels: apoee4, coglabs, dna, DNA replication, myDNA, youtube

This Flash movie has 160,000 years of human development in just a few minutes - starting in East Central Africa. About 90,000 years ago there was a rapid and deep freezing which wiped out most of early man (a scenario which has been repeated occasionally).

The spread of genetic factors (such as APOEe4, which allowed some individuals to better weather famine) follows along with the migration routes.

Australia was populated long before most of Europe and the Americas.

Labels: africa, apoee4, bradshaw foundation, evolution

Dr. James Watson, usually credited with unraveling of DNA along with Francis Crick, became one of the first people to have his own personal genome mapped - maybe the first.

This entails a thorough assessment which can lead to a better understanding of risk factors for certain diseases and conditions which append their outcomes to genetic antecedents.

Think of it, perhaps, as a structural engineer conducting a risk assessment or failure analysis on a highway overpass or skyscraper - a personal genome map accomplishes this task for the superstucture of your physical body.

With this information in hand, 'bugs' in the program can be identified and corrected, sometimes due to junk code in our DNA left over from an evolutionary branch that was not followed.

With the Brain - APOEe4 positive is one of the genetic conditions to watch for since it greatly impacts Alzheimer's Disease and early onset cases across the human family.
So, exercising your brain and building cognitive reserve is good for everyone - APOEe4 assessment is key for those who are APOEe4 positive. Normally people are diagnosed without any genetic assessment when symptoms are already apparent. APOEe4 begins to impact individuals at a young age before there are any symptoms - knowing about it helps you take charge of your life.

Labels: apoee4, crick, dna, genome mapping, watson