Word: vagus
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...aware of it, but your heart has just slowed down a bit. Not to worry; it will speed up again when you inhale. This regular-irregular beat is a sign of a healthy interaction between heart and head. Each time you exhale, your brain sends a signal down the vagus nerve to slow the cardiac muscle. With each inhale, the signal gets weaker and your heart revs up. Inhale, beat faster. Exhale, beat slower. It's an ancient rhythm that helps your heart last a lifetime. And it leads to lesson No. 1 in how to manage stress and avoid...
Scientists have also learned that the old notion that 90% of sex is in the mind is literally true: the parts of the brain involved in sexual response include, at the very least, the sensory vagus nerves, the midbrain reticular formation, the basal ganglia, the anterior insula cortex, the amygdala, the cerebellum and the hypothalamus...
...HORIZON Researchers are exploring a similar technique that sends an electrical current through the vagus nerve--a major conduit wiring the heart and intestines--which then delivers it to the brain. Another approach, called regional transcranial magnetic stimulation, uses an electric coil shaped like a figure eight to create a magnetic field inside the pre-frontal cortex, which plays a key role in mood regulation...
Unhappy with your Zoloft? Unsatisfied by your Xenical? Help may be on the way. A new technology has emerged that may take the edge off depression (or appetite). The treatment, called vagus nerve stimulation, consists of mild electric shocks from an implanted generator that are fed into the depths of the brain via a nerve in the neck. The current travels from the pacemaker-like gadget in the patient?s chest, through wires to the vagus nerve, and delivers the "feel good" or "I?m full" message to the brain every few minutes. While the precise connection between the treatment...
...Tiffany Field, a Miami child psychologist who founded the Touch Research Institute six years ago with a $250,000 grant from Johnson & Johnson, says massage stimulates the vagus nerves, which then trigger processes that aid digestion, among other things. As a result of their speedy weight gain, Field says, massaged preemies are discharged to their parents an average of six days earlier, shaving $10,000 off their hospital tab. With 400,000 premature babies born in the U.S. every year, the potential cost savings are apparent. And eight months after birth, Field says, massaged preemies have superior motor skills...