Volume 5 Issue 3, March 2002

A new study reports the cloning of a family of 'orphan' G-protein-coupled receptors that are localized in human and rat small sensory neurons. These receptors are activated by a peptide derived from preproenkephalin A and may be involved in modulating nociception.

A puzzle of systems neuroscience, how the CNS encodes time intersects with a question that fascinates developmental biologists, the elimination of synaptic connections.

Proposed mechanisms for the sensation of cold have focused on single proteins. A paper in this issue reports that cold trans-duction depends on a complex interplay among ion channels.

The human frontal cortex has been reported to be proportion-ally larger than in other primates. Magnetic resonance scans of humans, apes and monkeys now cast doubt on this idea.

A new event-related fMRI study suggests that decisions about trustworthiness involve structures that process emotions, and raises intriguing questions about cues used for such judgments.