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"Previous research on rhesus macaques discovered that social rank influenced components of the stress response, brain, and immune system. With gene chip technology for measuring the expression of over 6,000 different genes, Tung, Gilad and colleagues at Yerkes, Emory University, and Johns Hopkins looked for the first time in primates at the effects of social rank on genetic function. Comparing 49 different female monkeys of different rank revealed significant changes in the expression of 987 genes, including 112 genes associated with immune system function. The result fits with data in monkeys where low rank and chronic stress lead to compromised immune function, and, more loosely, with human studies linking low socioeconomic status and high social stress to elevated disease risk."

A study published Sept. 29 by Luis Populin, a professor of anatomy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, shows that under specific conditions, a rhesus macaque monkey that normally would fail the "mark test" can still recognize itself in the mirror and perform actions that scientists would expect from animals that are self-aware.

"Lauren Brent: The discovery of friendship in animals Primatologist and evolutionary biologist Lauren Brent has spent over 6 years researching monkeys in the hopes of explaining how social behaviors evolved in our closest living relative"

Theodore Berger and his team at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering's Department of Biomedical Engineering have developed a neural prosthesis for rats that is able to restore their ability to form long-term memories after they had been pharmacologically blocked. In a dramatic demonstration, Berger blocked the ability to rats to form long-term memories by using pharmacological agents to disrupt the neural circuitry that communicates between two subregions of the hippocampus, CA1 and CA3, which interact to create long-term memory, prior research has shown. The rats were unable to remember which lever to pull to gain a reward, or could only remember for 5-10 seconds, when previously they could remember for a long period of time. The researchers then developed an artificial hippocampal system that could duplicate the pattern of interaction between CA3-CA1 interactions. Long-term memory capability returned to the pharmacologically blocked rats when the team activated the electronic device programmed to duplicate the memory-encoding function. The researchers went on to show that if a prosthetic device and its associated electrodes were implanted in animals with a normal, functioning hippocampus, the device could actually strengthen the memory being generated internally in the brain and enhance the memory capability of normal rats. "These integrated experimental modeling studies show for the first time that with sufficient information about the neural coding of memories, a neural prosthesis capable of real-time identification and manipulation of the encoding process can restore and even enhance cognitive mnemonic processes," says the paper. Next steps, according to Berger and Deadwyler, will be attempts to duplicate the rat results in primates (monkeys), with the aim of eventually creating prostheses that might help human victims of Alzheimer's disease, stroke, or injury recover function. Ref.: "A Cortical Neural Prosthesis for Restoring and Enhancing

"Empathy Linked to Gene -- and We Can Tell Variations in the genes for oxytocin receptors may influence empathy -- and we can tell who's got them in 20 seconds. In the study, by Aleksandr Kogan of UC Berkeley, 24 couples provided DNA samples and then the couples recounted to each other a time when they had suffered. The conversations were videotaped. Then, observers wached 20-second segments of the videos and were asked to rate each person as kind, trustworthy and compassionate. The observers tended to pick the people in the couples who had a variation in the oxytocin receptor gene known as the GG genotype. It's interesting enough that empathy might be linked to variations in our genes. And also interesting that we humans are so exquisitely sensitive to social cues that we can easily and quickly pick this out."

Following Baumeister et al.'s widely cited work on self-regulation, many psychologists view will-power as a depletable resource. According to this view, whenever we perform acts of self-regulation (e.g. resisting a delicious piece of cake) we tap into our individual will-power reservoir (think of it as a bank account), and thereby reduce the amount of will-power left for subsequent tasks. According to a study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, however, this plausible intuition does not necessarily seem to hold true entirely.