It is possible to image the brain of a single fruit fly, but how about 100? This is what, MBF Bioscience Customer and Assistant Professor of Biology at Stanford University, Mark Schnitzer, would like to do. In an interview published in the October 16 issue of Science, Schnitzer explained that "massive brain imaging" would revolutionize brain research by allowing neuroscientists to simultaneously study multiple flies of...
Read MoreStress is something we’d all like to have a little less of. Though it is a natural, genetic response that allows us to adapt to various situations, stress can certainly impede upon daily life. If allowed to reach chronic levels, stress can "cause damage and accelerate disease," one of the main points of Dr. Bruce McEwen’s 2002 book The End of Stress As We Know...
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The developing and adult central nervous system of the mouse is complex and large. NIH Neuroscientist Dr. Charles Gerfen uses Neurolucida and NeuroInfo to collect, display, and share virtual slides with the research community. Recently, Dr. Gerfen requested software enhancements to better allow him to categorize and use his virtual slide data in mouse brain testing. We were happy to comply. Dr. Gerfen explains how he uses...
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Optogenetics is a fairly new scientific field that combines optical stimulation with genetic engineering. According to a recent article in Wired magazine, neuroscientist, psychologist, and MBF Bioscience customer Dr. Karl Deisseroth and his team of researchers at Stanford University are making major optogenetic advancements - the kind that might lead to a cure for Parkinson's Disease. It all began in 1979, when one of the discoverers...
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MBF Bioscience President Jack Glaser appears on the cover of this month's Business People-Vermont magazine. Read the informative feature article "Microscopic Vision" to find out how MBF Bioscience got its start, and how researchers like neuroscientist Henry Markram, are using our products today to make important advances in a range of scientific fields. {Photo by Brad Pettengill, courtesy of Business People-Vermont}...
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At MBF Bioscience, we are committed to delivering innovative products and unrivaled support to our customers and collaborators. Our development team and staff scientists actively engage with leading scientific researchers to develop new technology as they work to further advance the field. Recently, several of our customers worked closely with us to advance virtual slide technology to create high resolution brain atlases and morphometric analyses using...
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Thousands of people in the United States have spinal cord injuries (SCIs), with associated loss of movement and sensation below the site of the injury. Neural and glial cell transplants into research animals after SCI have correlated with recovery of function. The improvement may be caused by the transplanted cells; it’s thought that remyelination by the transplanted glial cells is the main reason for the...
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One factor that makes a neuron uniquely suited for a particular function is its morphology, including where and how the dendrites extend. The nature of the dendritic arbor affects the connectivity and electrical properties of the neuron, and arbor abnormalities are associated with neurological diseases. Many classification schemes have been based on neuronal morphology but in an article from the December 2007 issue of Neuron,...
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Neurolucida is used for reconstruction and morphometric analysis of neurons and anatomical regions of interest. Neurolucida can also be used for quantitative and qualitative analysis of dendritic spines. Spines are small, often bulbous protrusions that emerge from the dendritic shaft. They are the main site of excitatory synapses in the brain [1], and they range in length from 0.001 to 1mm and range in diameter...
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We continue to take an active role in assisting researchers become proficient in design-based stereology with this publication. It is intended to introduce the methodology to scientists who are interested in, but not familiar with, its application in neuroscience and other biomedical research fields. A concise, accessible book, this text is an excellent first resource for scientists. Available at amazon.com or by contacting MBF Bioscience. ...
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