News & Updates

Scientists at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) in Toronto are set to test a novel approach to transcranial magnetic stimulation that may better organize the brain to relieve symptoms of depression, and possibly reduce the long-term risk of dementia.

A major clinical trial of accelerated theta-burst brain stimulation, funded by Brain Canada and Bell Let’s Talk, holds the promise of potentially easing the debilitating symptoms of treatment-resistant depression within a week.

Imagine a neurosurgeon using light or sound to manipulate specific cells in your brain and restore your brain health. Instead of implanting electrodes and buzzing broader areas of your brain to help relieve symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, for example, a neurosurgeon would use gene therapy to deliver light-sensitive proteins into specific brain cells affected by the disease and use light to stimulate only those cells.

A fundamental research discovery from a 2012 Brain Canada MIRI grant is now bringing relief to patients living with an eating disorder, which has the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric disease after substance use.

Brain Canada and Brain Changes Initiative recently announced $1.1 million in funding for new brain research in Canada through the Innovation Grants for Research Impact in Traumatic Brain Injury program. Two of the three recipients are focusing on an area of research that has emerged over the last decade: traumatic brain injury (TBI) related to intimate partner violence (IPV).

Mental health conditions affect women differently than men. For example, women are more likely than men to develop anxiety, depression, and traumatic stress-related disorders. Yet only 3% of neuroscience studies are focused on women, and only about 5% include sex in the study design in a way that allows scientists to make comparisons between sexes.