Experts at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Labs have attempted to control the neural activity inside the brain of a primate using lasers, for the first time in history. This type of effort is not a new one, and previous attempts of doing that focused more on flies, rodents and fish. However, the most recent test centered around a much more complex brain, and yielded successful results – the researchers managed to activate a certain set of specific neurons using nothing but lasers.
The find paves the way for the development of new – and potentially more efficient – therapies for a wide range of human mental diseases, which are currently in desperate need of an effective cure. “It paves the way for new therapies that could target a number of psychiatric disorders. This is very exciting from a translational standpoint,” the leader of the current research, MIT Neuroscientist Ed Boyden, shared. He and postdoctoral fellow Xue Han were the main architects of the new laser system.
“Many disorders are associated with changes in specific cell types. For therapeutic purposes, you want to affect certain cells, but you want to leave normal cells intact. The ability to use light to turn specific cells on and off with very precise timing could in principle allow new therapies,”
WIRED quotes Boyden as saying. The expert also emphasized the differences between the new approach and existing ones. While lasers zero in on very specific portions of the brain, especially on certain types of neurons, drugs and electrodes tend to cover significantly larger areas.
“Our ability to remedy problems in the brain may ultimately be limited by how many side effects occur. We could find ways to shut down seizures, but the side effects might be intolerable. By pinpointing specific cell types, we could craft therapeutic neuromodulators and directly develop therapies, while preserving a high degree of well-being,” Boyden also explained. He even envisions light-emitting neural prosthetic devices, which could be inserted in the brain at one point, and then operate directly from there whenever they are required to.
“This is a very important and exciting step forward for all systems neuroscience. There are many limitations with the current way we try to understand neural circuits, primarily the lack of specificity. The hope is that, as this sort of research continues in labs around the world, it will become possible to specifically target many different classes of neurons. We can learn how each of them contributes to specific cognitive functions,” another neuroscientist, who preferred to remain anonymous, shared about the achievement. Over the last few months, primate researchers have come under attack from animal protection groups, and some even fear for their lives.
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