Twenty early-career researchers from across Canada will receive $100,000 each in funding for innovative projects to better understand the brain, through one of Brain Canada's flagship programs Future Leaders in Canadian Brain Research.
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IMAGE: Right, miRNA29-deficient mice showing a marked increase in the important enzyme DNMT3A (bright light blue). view more
Credit: Deshmukh Lab, UNC School of Medicine
CHAPEL HILL, NC - A team led by scientists at the UNC School of Medicine identified a molecule called microRNA-29 as a powerful controller of brain maturation in mammals. Deleting microRNA-29 in mice caused problems very similar to those seen in autism, epilepsy, and other neurodevelopmental conditions.
The results, published in
Cell Reports, illuminate an important process in the normal maturation of the brain and point to the possibility that disrupting this process could contribute to multiple human brain diseases.