Richard Vevers, a toilet paper salesman, decides that he’s had enough. He packs his bags and travels across the world to Australia, where he reinvents himself as an underwater photographer. All is well in the beginning, but before long, he starts realizing that something is not quite right. On each diving expedition, he comes across fewer and fewer of his favorite marine animals, and the vibrant colors of the corals seem to be fading away, leaving behind bright, white rocks.

You don’t usually notice it, but you are, in fact, continuously learning how to walk. It happens when you first step onto a slippery sidewalk in a pair of new shoes, or when you try to carry a tray full of drinks. Your brain quickly realises that the same routine isn’t going to cut it, and a new strategy must be implemented before something embarrassing, or painful, happens. With time and practice, you learn to store many different walking patterns, that allow movement across your body to stay coordinated and properly calibrated, no matter where you find yourself.

Radiotherapy can effectively reduce or even eliminate some tumours; others, however, show enduring resistance. Considering the potentially harmful side effects of radiotherapy, clinicians agree that it is paramount to be able to determine if a patient will benefit from radiotherapy before exposing them to any of the associated risks.

Despite significant efforts to develop biomarkers that can assess the potential efficacy of radiotherapy treatment for individual patients, there is currently no established diagnostic test that can provide a clear answer.

One of the main challenges in treating psychiatric disorders is the ability to predict which treatment will work best. The Neuropsychiatry Unit at the Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown is using a procedure called TMS (Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation) to treat drug-resistant depression and to assess whether and how it could be used for personalizing patient treatment.

Sherlock Holmes is perhaps the most famous example of the power of inference – using indirect evidence to reveal hidden truths. Understanding the neural basis of this sophisticated cognitive skill has been a long-standing challenge for neuroscientists. Now, a clever experiment that comes in two flavors – human and mouse – offers a way forward with a promising set of results.

Illustration by: Diogo Matias.

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Thoughts, sensations, and emotions zap across the brain via a meshwork of fine nerve fibers called axons. Axon size is crucially important for general brain function as well as in certain neurological conditions. Experts have been striving to establish a means to non-invasively measure these fibers for many years. An international team of researchers has now developed a novel MRI method that manages to do just that.

Image credit: ommyvideo (pixabay.com)

The Champalimaud Foundation is pleased to announce that ProCAncer-I: An AI Platform integrating imaging data and models, supporting precision care through prostate cancer’s continuum, submitted to the Horizon 2020 DT-TDS-05-2020 topic, has been retained for funding with an amazing score of 15 out of 15 points.

“la Caixa” Foundation Junior Leadership call, an internationally competitive call aiming to attract and maintain internationally competitive researchers of any nationality to Portugal and Spain, has awarded six fellowships to researchers of 6 nationalities working at the Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown (CCU), ITQB and IGC.

Food has something of a “magic hold” on us, as certain flavors and textures can pretty much dictate what we do. Just think about the spicy dish that keeps bringing you back to that remote Chinese restaurant, or the irresistibly creamy but expensive ice-cream at the Italian place on the corner.

But is it only your palate that controls your food choices? It may feel like it, but the answer is no. In fact, much of what is going on happens beyond the walls of your mouth, through interactions between your digestive system and your brain.

Henrique Veiga-Fernandes is the first Portuguese investigator selected for a CZI (Chan Zuckerberg Initiative) grant. The project, selected for the Single-Cell Analysis of Inflammation grant, comprises a team of three prominent scientists that will join forces to unravel neuro-immune interactions and their potential therapeutic contributions to pulmonary infection and inflammation.