After providing all the funding for The Brain from Top to Bottom for over 10 years, the CIHR Institute of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Addiction informed us that because of budget cuts, they were going to be forced to stop sponsoring us as of March 31st, 2013.

We have approached a number of organizations, all of which have recognized the value of our work. But we have not managed to find the funding we need. We must therefore ask our readers for donations so that we can continue updating and adding new content to The Brain from Top to Bottom web site and blog.

Please, rest assured that we are doing our utmost to continue our mission of providing the general public with the best possible information about the brain and neuroscience in the original spirit of the Internet: the desire to share information free of charge and with no adverstising.

Whether your support is moral, financial, or both, thank you from the bottom of our hearts!

Bruno Dubuc, Patrick Robert, Denis Paquet, and Al Daigen




Monday, 3 February 2014
Glial Cells Too Are Sensitive to the Environment

For a long time, the brain’s glial cells were assumed to be mere “filler” between the neurons. For a while after that, the glial cells were assumed to serve primarily nutritive functions. But now, year after year, research findings are showing glial cells to be more and more complex. For example, recent studies have shown their role in brain plasticity and how social isolation can disrupt it.

More and more studies indicate that people who experience severe neglect and social isolation as children display cognitive and social impairments as adults. To examine this phenomenon, two research teams recreated these unfavourable conditions for baby mice by placing them in isolation for several weeks.

What the researchers observed was amazing. Oligodendrocytes are the glial cells that produce the myelin sheath—a fatty layer that surrounds neurons’ axons and serves as an electrical insulator, thus accelerating the conduction of nerve impulses. The myelin sheath is essential for neurons to function properly. But in the mice that the researchers subjected to social deprivation as babies, the oligodendrocytes failed to mature, and so the myelin was much thinner.

This finding means that neurons are not the only brain cells that can be modified by the environment: oligodendrocytes too display such plasticity. The researchers even identified a metabolic pathway by which social isolation leads to reduced myelination. This pathway involves the production of neuregulin-1 (NRG1, a protein essential for healthy brain development) and its receptor, ErbB3.

This reduced myelin production was observed in the prefrontal cortex, a part of the brain that is heavily involved in control of the emotions and in high-level cognitive functions. One of these studies noted that such changes in the myelination of the cortex are observed in certain psychiatric disorders, such as depression. And another study showed that the myelin sheath develops more slowly in the cortexes of humans than in those of chimpanzees and takes far longer to mature; the maturation period extends beyond adolescence into early adulthood. But this longer maturation period for the myelin associated with the emergence of specifically human cognitive functions entails greater vulnerability as well.

The plasticity of the glial cells is beginning to help us understand the mechanisms underlying this vulnerability. Thus, although glial cells may be less numerous than was once believed, they are certainly more important too.

i_lien How Early Social Deprivation Impairs Long-Term Cognitive Function
a_his A Critical Period for Social Experience–Dependent Oligodendrocyte Maturation and Myelination
i_lien New Form of Brain Plasticity: How Social Isolation Disrupts Myelin Production
a_his Impaired adult myelination in the prefrontal cortex of socially isolated mice
i_lien Human Brains Develop Wiring Slowly, Differing from Chimpanzees
a_his Prolonged myelination in human neocortical evolution

From the Simple to the Complex | Comments Closed


If you have a comment, please e-mail it to me, and I will post it here.