Medical Discovery News
Science permeates everyday life. Yet the understanding of advances in biomedical science is limited at best. Few people make the connection that biomedical science is medicine and that biomedical scientists are working today for the medicine of tomorrow. Our weekly five-hundred-word newspaper column (http://www.illuminascicom.com/) and two-minute radio show provide insights into a broad range of biomedical science topics. Medical Discovery News is dedicated to explaining discoveries in biomedical research and their promise for the future of medicine. Each release is designed to stimulate listeners to think, question and appreciate how science affects their health as well as that of the rest of the world. We also delve into significant biomedical discoveries and portray how science (or the lack of it) has impacted health throughout history.
Medical Discovery News
The Place for an Ultimate Connection: The Brain
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932 The Place for Ultimate Connections
Welcome to Medical Discovery News. I’m Dr. Norbert Herzog.
And I’m Dr. David Niesel
The brain is by far our most complex organ. It’s fair to say there’s so much to learn that we don’t know what we don’t know.
One new study involves a tiny piece of brain tissue sample taken from the cortex of an epilepsy patient. The cortex is where learning, sensory processing, and problem-solving happens.
Researchers sliced the sample into five thousand ultra-thin tissue sections and stained them to “color identify” different cells and features which were then visualized with an electron microscope.
They digitized the images and used AI to analyze the one point four million gigabytes of data! The spectacularly colorful images of the sliced tissues were then assembled into a three-D rendering.
It allowed researchers to see communication networks and how different brain cells are organized and interact. They found more than fifty-five thousand cells and one hundred fifty million synapses.
Synapses are junctions between neurons where chemicals or electric signals flow to allow communication between the cells. Surprisingly, more than ninety percent of the neurons there had just one to two connections with other cells. But some had up to fifty.
They found some cells formed knots around themselves and some neurons paired with other neurons to form a mirror image. More studies will be required to answer why.
By making all the data available to other researchers, this work will continue to yield a treasure trove of new information on the brain.
We are Drs. David Niesel and Norbert Herzog, at UTMB and Quinnipiac University, where biomedical discoveries shape the future of medicine. For much more and our disclaimer go to medicaldiscoverynews.com or subscribe to our podcast. Sign up for expanded print episodes at www.illuminascicom.com
