Psychiatrist discusses the complexities of ketamine treatment and the risks of at-home use

When administered correctly and under the supervision of a professional, ketamine can be a life-changing treatment for major depression. But following regulatory changes put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic that made telemedicine more accessible, the drug’s off-label, unsupervised use has skyrocketed despite limited data supporting the safety and efficacy of that practice.

Sedentary time may significantly increase adolescent heart size

In adolescents, sedentary time may increase heart size three times more than moderate-to-vigorous physical activity, a paper published in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports concludes. The study was conducted in collaboration between the University of Bristol in the U.K., the University of Exeter in the U.K., and the University of Eastern Finland. The researchers explored the associations of sedentary time, light physical activity, and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity with cardiac structure and function.

Novel microelectrode array system enables long-term cultivation and analyses of brain organoid

Brain organoids are self-organizing tissue cultures grown from patient cell-derived induced pluripotent stem cells. They form tissue structures that resemble the brain in vivo in many ways. This makes brain organoids interesting for studying both normal brain development and for the development of neurological diseases. However, organoids have been poorly studied in terms of neuronal activity, as measured by electrical signals from the cells.