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WORMS might not look clever, but they could teach us a thing or two about our
own brains, say researchers. Patrick Nef, from Swiss pharmaceuticals giant Roche
in Basel, and his colleagues have created mutant Caenorhabditis elegans
worms that are extra-smart. These mutant worms, which made higher amounts of a
signalling protein called NCS-1, learned to make new associations between
temperature and food faster than normal and remembered them for longer (
Neuron, vol 30, p 241). Humans have NCS-1 in their brains too, and the
researchers suspect it plays a vital role in the formation of memories.
Understanding how it works could lead to new treatments for diseases such as
Alzheimer’s and schizophrenia.