Dementia

...ba href=/dementia/a/b is a beautiful thing if it only lets you remember the good things.

But, the more I considered it, I decided that it was not the ba href=/dementia/a/b speaking, but instead the way my mother truly viewed her life.

Mom was born in 1913 in a small town near Springfield, Mo.

She had a first cousin born on the same day, in the same town, and for some reason the family thought it was a good idea to give the two little girls the same name - Mamie.

Their middle names were the only thing different.

Because of this my mother always used her middle initial, "C." No problem!

She was raised on a small farm where my grandmother kept a garden, raised chickens and pigs and had a cow.

Even though they were very poor, they always had food on the table.

Her cousin Minnie was older and bigger than Mom and her family was not as poor, so Mom always got clothing Minnie had outgrown.

She always dressed well.

In 1932, Mom married my father, William Brayfield, and, wouldn't you know, Dad's mother's name was Mamie Ellen Brayfield.

So now there were two Mamie Brayfields.

Mom continued to use her middle initial for the rest of her life.

Although my father worked hard, they always struggled financially.

Raising five children could not have been easy.

Mom always said, "When you are poor, you are always poor," and she just accepted it.

No problem.

In 1942, my father came to the Bay Area to look for work in the shipyards in Richmond.

Mom often recalled the story of how he sent for us - with a three-word telegr...

...ba href=/dementia/a/b, which can cause personality and behavioral changes.While Chrissy Lamun performs flips and dismounts and demonstrates the athletic skills that have made her one of the most accomplished OSU gymnasts in recent years, her mom watches in silence.

But knowing mom is there - Sandy Lamun has attended most of the Beavers' meets this season - has provided inspiration for her daughter.

She's expected to be at Gill Coliseum tonight for the Pac-10 championships."My perspective has definitely changed," said Lamun, 22, a 5-foot-5 senior from Reno, Nev.

"She wasn't expected to make it past January and then definitely not through the season, and she got to be there on senior night."Mother and daughter are bonded in ways that words can't explain."The woman is strong.

She always has been," Lamun said.

"She was the rock of our family."Lamun's ability to compete at such a high level through trying times speaks volumes about her strength as well.OSU's captain maintains a positive disposition.

The smile she wears after completing routines on floor, balance beam, uneven parallel bars and vault is visible most of the time."It's kind of what my parents have taught me in life," Lamun said.

"You can't go through life thinking that everything is so down and dreary.

You've got to find the positive thing.

You've got to look at the big picture."For Lamun, the big picture includes the love and support she has received from family and friends, teammates and coaches at OSU and being able to compet...

...ba href=/dementia/a/b and monitor their consequences to the brain,” said Hyman.

“This technique allows us to watch plaques and tangles in the living brain and directly observe the effects of therapeutic interventions.” Previously, the only way to clinically confirm a case of Alzheimer’s disease was through an autopsy.

John H.

Growdon, MD, of Harvard University, who chaired the committee that selected the Prize recipients, said, “Dr.

Hyman’s early work displaying the neuronal system damage that accounts for the behavioral signs of Alzheimer’s -was key to future developments in detecting and treating the disorder.

His current work involving innovative microscopic imaging techniques is a giant leap forward in the field.” Ashe: Discovery of new form of amyloid-beta Ashe’s research has examined the basis of memory loss at the molecular level in mice.

“Our findings show that the clumps of amyloid-beta and tau proteins in plaques and tangles are not the main culprits of memory loss,” said Ashe.

She and coworkers have discovered a different form of amyloid-beta called A?

star (A?

*) that impairs memory.

“Now our focus will be to identify tau*, an abnormal form of tau that disrupts cognitive function.” (For a report of this study - click here) Duff: Treatment for plaques and tangles Duff has created several models of Alzheimer’s disease and is currently looking at treatment approaches against both plaques and tangles.

Her recent work has shown that a class of drugs known as kinas...