Serotonin can act as a growth factor for the stem cells in the fetal human brain that determine brain size. During human evolution, the size of the brain increased, especially in a particular part ...

ARHGAP11B -- this complex name is given to a gene that is unique to humans and plays an essential role in the development of the neocortex. The neocortex is the part of the brain to which we owe our ...

To build the neocortex, a brain area involved in higher cognitive functions, stem cells produce billions of neurons of various types. In a Science study, neuroscientists from Switzerland, Belgium, and ...

The question of what makes modern humans unique has long been a driving force for researchers. Comparisons with our closest relatives, the Neandertals, therefore provide fascinating insights. The ...

Researchers from Dresden uncover a greater neuron production in the frontal lobe during brain development in modern humans than Neandertals, due to the change of a single amino acid in the protein ...

Dresden and Leipzig researchers find that stem cells in the developing brain of modern humans take longer to divide and make fewer errors when distributing their chromosomes to their daughter cells, ...

In a bid to better understand, and potentially treat, a host of conditions that affect early cognition, neurodevelopment and the brain later in life, investigators at Johns Hopkins Medicine and ...