2023-12-13 18:03:45
Updated Wednesday, December 13, 2023 – 17:03
Advances in neurotechnology are allowing us to unravel keys to brain functioning. ‘Nature’ publishes this week the most complete characterization of the mouse brain
Visualization that shows different cell types ‘mapped’ in the mouse brain.Chen & Macosko labsSpecial Why understanding the brain is going to be a new Renaissance: “We are going to understand who we are inside” Neuroscience They manage to configure the first ‘Brain Atlas’ to know the neurons cell by cell
The publication, a few months ago, of the first atlas of the human brain was a very important step in understanding how it works and what the keys of that organ that coordinates the body and houses our mind.
Experts such as Rafael Yuste, professor of Neurobiology and Neuroscience at Columbia University (USA), then predicted the arrival of “a new Renaissance”, a revolution in neuroscience which would allow, in the medium term, to build a general theory about the structure, connections and function of the brain.
“We’ve been gutting the molecules and cells in the brain for 100 years, but what we haven’t done yet is put all the pieces of that puzzle together. However, we are beginning to see light at the end of the tunnel, there is beginning to be a general theory of how all those neurons fit together and what the brain is for,” said Yuste in this recent special on the brain published in EL MUNDO.
“It is similar to what happened with the gentic. Scientists had also been accumulating data for about 100 years, putting all the pieces of the puzzle on the table, but they did not know how to fit it together until with Watson and Crick, actually also with the data stolen from Rosalind Franklin, came the DNA double helix model. I think a similar thing is going to happen in neuroscience. There will be a general theory that brings together all this data that are now floating and that will allow scientists and doctors not only to understand how the brain generates the human mind, but also to understand brain diseases and be able to tackle and cure them,” he stressed.
That goes towards a better understanding of the brain expands this week with the publication in the magazine Nature of nine studies that, together, provide the most complete and detailed characterization of the mouse brain.
Why is it important to have the mouse brain map?
This mapping provides fundamental data on the structure and organization of the brain of these animals, as well as on the functioning of neural circuits and the brain cell function a nivel individual.
These new data will serve as a tool, as the scientific journal highlights, to advance research on the development and evolution of the mammalian brain, which has implications for understanding the genesis of neurological disorders.
“Echoing previous articles from just a few months ago, This consignment of articles is history again. It is another of the first salvos in what will be a torrent of studies in the next decade that will classify, using transcriptomics techniquesall the cell types of the body,” Yuste pointed out in statements to Science Media Centre Espaa in line with the Nature publication.
For the specialist, the most innovative thing about the new contributions is that “not only map brain cell typesbut the position of each type of neuron is mapped for the first time. “This is what is called spatial transcriptomics, using new microscopy techniques that allow transcriptomic analysis of specific positions in histological sections.”
“These data are not the end but the beginning of the path,” warns the researcher, who then points out the limitations of the new studies: “the information is only from the soma [cuerpo] of the neurons, it is a still photo of the genes that were active at a given moment and they do not tell us which ones were important. There is still a lot of work to do. In any case andThis consignment of articles is impressive“he concludes.
And how does knowing the brain of a worm help us?
Another article recently signed by researchers from the Laboratory of Molecular Biology of the Medical Research Council in Cambridge (United Kingdom) also represents a important advance in the field of neurobiology. These scientists, among whom is the Spanish Lidia Ripollhave managed to reveal the first wireless map of the nervous system of a worm.
Specifically, they have managed to detail how in C. elegans individuals communication occurs through neuropeptides, small proteins with action on the nervous system. Oxytocin or thyroid hormone are some of these molecules that are capable of generating connections between neurons that are not next to each other. Their networks, therefore, can be considered as a wireless connectome.
Ripoll uses an analogy to explain it: “Let’s imagine that neurons are towns or cities. The synapses would be the highways, the standard paths that connect these towns and cities to each other. But in addition to these roads, there are other means of communication. “Neuromodulators act like traffic signals, like traffic lights or speed signs that allow connections to be created between towns and cities that are not connected by a road,” he explains. In addition, these signals can act as switches, for example increasing or reducing the strength of a synapse, adds the researcher.
Understand how these work wireless networks It may be key to understanding issues such as the neural basis of behavior or finding pharmacological targets for different disorders.
“The basic neuropeptide signaling mechanisms are shared by all animals“The neuropeptides are released from neurons and diffuse to distant areas to bind to receptors on other neurons,” says Ripoll, who points out that “the nervous system of the worm is anatomically small, but at a molecular level its neuropeptide systems are very complex.” , showing significant parallels with those of larger animals. We hope that the connectome of neuropeptides C. elegans serve as a prototype to understand wireless signaling in larger nervous systems.”
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