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Olfactory MRI Radiomics Link pTau217 to Alzheimer’s Cognition

MHD featured image for olfactory MRI radiomics, pTau217, and Alzheimer's disease cognitive impairment.

A 2026 multi-cohort Alzheimer’s disease study found that MRI radiomics from the hippocampus and amygdala linked plasma pTau217 and smell identification to cognitive impairment — with more added cognitive signal than simple regional volume. The result is useful because it points to a possible bridge between blood biomarkers and brain-circuit damage, but it is still …

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Late Chronotype MRI Signal Vanishes After Strict Correction

Stylized illustration of an early-morning sky and a late-night sky meeting over a brain in profile, representing the structural neuroimaging question about chronotype in healthy young adults.

Popular coverage of chronotype neuroimaging usually claims that late chronotypes (evening types, often called “night owls”) show smaller cortical regions and faster brain aging than early chronotypes (morning types). A 2026 multimodal structural MRI analysis from Beheshti and Elkana ran the comparison in 136 healthy young adults using strict whole-brain correction, and the group differences …

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GABA and Dopamine Shape Human Speech Control in PET-fMRI Study

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A 2026 PET-fMRI study of 20 healthy adults found that GABAA receptor binding tracked speech-production brain activity across frontal, temporal, parietal, putaminal, supplementary motor, and cerebellar regions, with peak GABA-BOLD correlations reaching Rs = 0.9.1 Human speech control looks less like a pure motor-output problem and more like a task-specific balance between inhibition, dopamine, and …

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Language and Theory of Mind Separate by Age 3 in Child Brain Scans

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A 2026 fMRI study found language and theory-of-mind activation already separated in 54 child sessions from ages 3-9, with strict child overlap near zero in the left superior temporal lobe (Dice 0.015) and no evidence that the 2 systems disentangled with age.1 The result pushes against a simple developmental story in which language grows out …

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Prostate Cancer Survivors Who Smoke Showed Lower Verbal Memory Scores

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A 2026 study involving 118 prostate cancer survivors found the clearest lifestyle-cognition signal around smoking: smokers learned fewer words across repeated verbal-memory trials, while obesity and physical activity produced narrower reaction-time findings and no significant anxiety or depression differences. Research Highlights Smoking tracked verbal learning: in 118 prostate cancer survivors, smokers scored lower on Verbal …

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Multiple Sclerosis Iron MRI Linked to Cognitive Impairment in 12 Studies

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A 2026 systematic review of advanced neuroimaging in multiple sclerosis narrowed 600 database records to 12 studies and found the clearest cognition signal in basal ganglia iron-sensitive MRI measures, while thalamic susceptibility was more variable and often tangled with atrophy. Research Highlights Basal ganglia signal was strongest: across 12 studies, elevated susceptibility or iron-related metrics …

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Neck-to-Height Ratio Screens Pediatric Sleep Apnea Better Than BMI

Editorial medical card showing pediatric sleep apnea screening with neck measurement, PSG waveforms, and airway anatomy.

A 2026 polysomnography study involving 685 children found that neck-to-height ratio identified moderate/severe pediatric obstructive sleep apnea better than BMI Z-score, waist-to-height ratio, or hip-to-height ratio. The signal was useful but not diagnostic: neck-to-height ratio reached AUC 0.781 overall, which is strong enough for triage but not strong enough to replace a sleep study.1 Research …

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