Until today, official medicine believed that the adult brain is not capable of renewing itself. He is akin to a machine, and can neither change nor be restored - only... break down. But how then can we explain the numerous cases of so-called “miraculous healings”, which today are difficult to classify as myths, since the facts are too obvious? If the patient wants to live, medicine is powerless...
Latest Research in the brain area showed how little we know about ourselves and how sparingly we use our capabilities
We have the power to “reprogram” our “ Personal Computer between the ears,” and through this change and restore your physical body. What is needed for this? What you always do to achieve success in any field. Patience. Hard work. And the main thing is faith.
Now, in light of this scientific discovery, described in more detail below in Sarah Scott’s article “The Flexible Brain” and published in Reader’s Digest magazine, even inveterate skeptics will find it difficult to dismiss the obvious fact: a person is capable of changing himself - not only psychologically, but also physical level. And, as Baron Munchausen would say, thinking man I just have to do it!
And for those whose faith does not require proof, it may be interesting to know how this miracle happens “technically” - after all, even if a touch of mystery disappears from a miracle, in its place new mysteries and new questions are born, for example: if we allow such an analogy that our brain is a computer, and our body is a factory, then which part of our “I” is the operator? And what does his “qualification” depend on? Is it possible, even theoretically, to grow new organ? How does our consciousness influence external environment when a thought or intention materializes outside of our physical body? And how soon will research technology be able to track not only the emergence of new neurons, but also the connection between our “PC” and the “system administrator”?..
Flexible brain
Recent research shows that the least studied human organ has amazing ability reconfiguration and restoration.
One fine day in September 1995, Howard Rocket, a successful 48-year-old entrepreneur, was playing football in a suburb of Toronto. He wanted to intercept the ball, but slipped, fell and hit his head. A minute later, having come to my senses, I felt headache, which became stronger and stronger. Then flashed before his eyes dark spots. He tried not to pay attention to it, hoping that with time everything would pass. However, three weeks later, when Howard was home alone, he suddenly felt that his arms and legs were not obeying him. A sharp pain pierced my head, my vision went dark. He groped his way to the phone, miraculously dialed the ambulance number and lost consciousness.
Howard Rocket suffered a stroke: a blood clot clogged the vessel through which blood flows to the brain stem. Most people die in such a case, but he was saved by doctors who managed to administer a thrombolytic drug in time. However, the prognosis for the future was grim: doctors said that he left hand and leg will remain paralyzed. Their muscles were fine, but the parts of the brain that used to control them were seriously damaged. This means you will have to get used to the wheelchair.
But Rocket did not accept the doctors’ verdict and began to work hard physical therapy. He believed that if he worked his leg day after day, then over time the brain would “find an opportunity” to restore control over the muscles. Having learned to stand, he began to fasten his leg to the pedal of an exercise bike and train. The first time he was able to hold out for only 30 seconds, but he continued to practice. It was a kind of exercise for the brain.
12 years later, after thousands of hours of hard practice, Rocket could dance. The doctors were amazed. “It’s just amazing,” says neurocardiologist Robert Willinsky, who saved Rocket’s life. “He is a role model.”
The power of thought
As it turned out, Rocket was right: the brain can indeed be “reconfigured” in such a way that it replenishes the functions of failed areas. Until recently, most practicing doctors considered this idea utopian. They were sure that the adult brain is like a machine: it can neither change nor grow - it can only break down. However, over the past few decades, brain scanning techniques such as positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) have allowed scientists to observe this organ in action. They were now convinced that the traditional view of the brain was wrong.
If one part of the brain is damaged, especially in the cortex (the thin outer layer of the brain responsible for processing incoming information and regulating movement), then other parts of the brain can eventually take over its function. However, this requires painstaking work, which sometimes takes years. Nevertheless, scientists talk about the plasticity of nervous structures, that intense mental and physical exercise can change the brain at a structural level. “When a person thinks, the brain's hardware is updated,” says psychiatrist Norman Doidge of Toronto.
And these physical changes entail functional changes. In his book The Brain That Changes Itself, Doidge writes: “I knew a scientist who made people who were blind from birth begin to see; another helped deaf people regain their lost hearing. I've met people whose rates increased dramatically. mental development, although previously they were considered incapable of learning; I have seen evidence that 80 year olds can improve their memory to the level of 55 year olds. I saw people force their brains to work in new ways and recover from diseases that were considered incurable.” These changes occurred through repeated mental exercises. In other words, thoughts can change how the brain works.
Neurophysiologist Richard Davidson from the University of Wisconsin (USA) demonstrated the effectiveness of this therapy by conducting an experiment with meditation, a type of mental exercise. He measured the brain activity of Buddhist monks while they engaged in “compassion” meditation, which engenders feelings of love for all living things, and found a significant difference between novices and experienced monks. In the latter, the brain generated powerful gamma waves involved in the processes of higher nervous activity- perception and consciousness. Thus, the monks' many years of mental exercises changed the way their brains worked.
Meditation can also have a profound effect on our physical sensations, such as our perception of pain. Melissa Monroe, a former Canadian bodybuilding champion, learned at age 30 that a lump in her throat the size of a chicken egg was malignant Hodgkin lymphoma. The disease turned out to be so advanced that doctors told her: “You have cancer all over your body, from head to toe,” and determined that she had three months to live.
However, Melissa Monroe began to fight, despite the pain from the tumors that pressed on her internal organs, was unbearable even for her, an athlete accustomed to working to the limit physical capabilities. She turned to psychiatrist Tatyana Melnik for help, who taught her how to “tune” herself to relieve pain.
Pain is physical sensation, Melnik explained, but if you react to it emotionally, it will only intensify. The psychiatrist advised Melissa to take the pain for granted: “Don’t rate it as very or not very severe; just live with her.”
Mentally setting yourself up In a similar way, Monroe learned to cope with her reaction to the sensation of pain: she felt it, but was no longer dependent on it. “It was something that I experience,” she says, “but it didn’t seem to happen to me. I abstracted myself from the pain and didn’t let it twist me.”
Monroe defied fate and began intensive chemotherapy. After one complex procedure, when she returned home, she even lost consciousness and came to her senses only thanks to her sister, who gave her indirect massage hearts and artificial respiration. And in 2006, it was 6 years since doctors declared her cancer-free. And she continues to meditate.
New discoveries
How can thoughts or exercise change the brain? It turns out that they can influence the activity of genes. Research conducted in the 1980s and 1990s shows that genes can be turned on or off during learning of other mental or physical activities. It is not yet known exactly how this happens, but Dr. Doidge states: “When we think about the same thing over and over again, certain genes are turned on and begin to produce corresponding proteins, so that the structure of neurons changes and the number of connections between them increases.” . In other words, the communication capabilities of neurons increase.
New neurons can also form in the brain. In the laboratory of the University of Lethbridge in the Canadian province of Alberta, neuroscientist Brian Kolb and his colleagues demonstrated this in rats by causing a cerebrovascular accident that led to brain damage. It turned out that when animals were injected with a growth factor, they not only formed new neurons, but also replenished structurally and functionally damaged areas of the brain. Scientists made another stunning discovery: after two weeks, newly formed brain cells moved to the area of damage and, so to speak, awaited further orders. And if these cells are properly stimulated, they begin to function, restoring lost abilities, such as controlling the movement of limbs.
The work Kolb has done shows how important rehabilitation is for the damaged brain. Today, scientists are trying to find out whether the stimulation provided by physical and mental rehabilitation can increase the production of new brain cells and speed up the healing process.
One of the “incubators” of neurons is the hippocampus, which plays key role in mind. In one study, researchers at the University of Toronto used chemical tags to track the movement of naturally occurring brain cells in healthy mice. These mice were trained to swim to a fixed platform, and eventually, after numerous attempts, the mice remembered its location. When the brains of these mice were later studied, they found that the newly formed neurons were used to perform a memory task - the labeled cells were concentrated in “incubators” of the hippocampus.
The scientists also found that the newly formed neurons began to improve memory after just a month. According to neuroscientist Paul Frankland, who led the work, the study showed that the number of new brain cells depends on the environment. Cocaine use and stress, for example, weaken their education, while jogging and studying strengthen them.
Change the life
What scientists call neural plasticity, 21-year-old Ian Bradley simply calls hope. In seventh grade, he still couldn’t read, but wrote letters and numbers like a first grader. “I thought I was a fool,” he said. Throughout elementary school, his mother, Mary, spent hours reading textbooks and helping him with his written homework.
And then Bradley's father heard about Arrowsmith School. Its founder, Barbara Arrowsmith-Young, also had problems with learning disabilities at one time. And then she came up with mental exercises with which she could overcome her “inferiority.” She later developed new exercises that could help people with similar disabilities. Today, Arrowsmith programs are taught throughout North America.
Bradley spent three years in such a school, where he again and again performed exercises to train memory and attention, for example, making pairs of letters and their corresponding symbols. “It was terribly tiring,” he says. However, by the end of the course, he was already reading at an eighth-grade level. And today, a recent high school graduate whose academic performance has improved so much that in the 11th grade he was awarded certificate of honor, dreams of becoming a pilot. “My life used to be so dull,” he says. “And now I have a sky-high goal.”
New discoveries in the field of neuroscience offer hope for many: those suffering from the effects of stroke, those struggling with chronic pain, and young people with learning disabilities.
“So far, we have only been able to discover the mechanisms by which the brain can change,” says neurosurgeon Andres Lozano, one of those who helped save Howard Rocket.
Today, doctors and scientists are beginning to understand that the entrepreneur from Toronto who did not want to submit to the disease turned out to be right after all. Repeated repetition of exercises - both mental and physical - can change your brain. And your life too.
The brain is the most mysterious and mysterious human organ. It’s paradoxical, but our ideas about his work and how it actually happens are diametrically opposed things. The following experiments and hypotheses will lift the curtain on some of the secrets of the functioning of this “stronghold of thinking,” which scientists have not been able to capture to this day.
1. Fatigue is the peak of creativity
Job biological clock — internal system organism, which determines the rhythm of its life activity - has a direct impact on daily life of a person and his productivity in general. If you are a morning person, then the smartest thing to do is to do complex analytical work, requiring serious mental expenditure, in the morning or before noon. For night owls, in other words - “night owls” - this is the second half of the day, smoothly turning into night.
On the other hand, scientists advise taking on more creative work that requires activation of the right hemisphere when the body feels physically and mentally exhausted, and the brain is simply no longer able to understand the proof of Goldbach’s ternary problem. It sounds crazy, but if you dig a little deeper, you can still find a rational grain in this hypothesis. Somehow, this explains why moments like "Eureka!" occur while driving public transport after a long day at work or, if history is to be believed, in the bathroom. :)
With a lack of strength and energy, it is extremely difficult to filter the flow of information, analyze statistical data, find and, most importantly, remember cause-and-effect relationships. When it comes to creativity, the listed negative aspects take on a positive connotation, since this type of mental work involves generating new ideas and irrational thinking. In other words, a tired nervous system while working on creative projects more effective.
One of the articles in the popular American magazine Scientific American talks about why distraction plays a role in important role in the process of creative thinking:
“The ability to be distracted is very often the source non-standard solutions and original thoughts. At these moments the person is less concentrated and can perceive more wide range information. This “openness” allows you to evaluate alternative solutions to problems from a new angle, promotes the acceptance and creation of completely new, fresh ideas.”
2. The effect of stress on brain size
Stress is one of the most strong factors, affecting the normal functioning of the human brain. Recently, Yale University scientists proved that frequent stress and depression literally reduce the size of the central part of the body's nervous system.
The human brain cannot synchronize decision-making processes in relation to two separate problems. Trying to do two things at the same time only exhausts our cognitive abilities by switching from one problem to another.
If a person is concentrated on one thing, the prefrontal cortex plays the main role, controlling all excitatory and depressive impulses.
“The anterior part of the brain is responsible for forming goals and intentions. For example, the desire “I want to eat that piece of cake” in the form of an exciting impulse passes through the neural network, reaches the posterior prefrontal cortex, and you already enjoy the treat.”
4. Nap increases mental activity
It is well known what influence has healthy sleep. The question is, what impact does napping have? As it turned out, short “blackouts” throughout the day have an equally positive effect on mental activity.
Memory improvement
After finishing the experiment on memorizing 40 illustrated cards, one group of participants slept for 40 minutes, while the second was awake. As a result of subsequent testing, it turned out that participants who had the chance to take a short nap remembered the cards much better:
“It’s hard to believe, but the group that got enough sleep managed to recall 85% of the cards in their memory, while the rest remembered only 55%.”
Apparently, a short nap helps our central computer “crystallize” memories:
“Research shows that newly formed memories in the hippocampus are very fragile and can be easily erased from memory, especially if space is needed for new information. A short nap appears to “push” recently learned data to the new cortex (neocortex), the site long-term storage memories, thus protecting them from destruction.”
Improving the learning process
In the course of research conducted by professors University of California (The University of California), a group of students was faced with quite difficult task, requiring study large quantity new information. Two hours after the start of the experiment, half of the volunteers, just as in the case of the cards, slept for a short period of time.
At the end of the day, the well-rested participants not only completed the task better and learned the material better, but their “evening” productivity significantly exceeded the indicators obtained before the start of the study.
What happens during sleep?
Some recent studies showed that during sleep the activity of the right hemisphere increases significantly, while the left hemisphere behaves extremely quietly. :)
This behavior is completely unusual for him, since in 95% of the world's population the left hemisphere is dominant. Andrey Medvedev, author this study, made a very funny comparison:
“While we sleep, the right hemisphere is constantly busy around the house.”
5. Vision is the main “trump card” of the sensory system
Despite the fact that vision is one of the five components of the sensory system, the ability to perceive electromagnetic radiation in the visible spectrum is significantly more important than the others:
“Three days after studying any text material, you will remember only 10% of what you read. A few relevant images can increase this figure by 55%.
Illustrations much more effective than text partly because reading itself does not bring the expected results. Our brain perceives words as tiny images. It takes more time and energy to understand the meaning of one sentence than to look at a colorful picture.”
There are actually several downsides to relying so heavily on our visual system. Here is one of them:
“Our brain is forced to constantly make guesses, since it has no idea where exactly the visible objects are. A person lives in three-dimensional space, while light falls on the retina of his eye in a two-dimensional plane. So we think of everything we can’t see.”
The picture below shows which part of the brain is responsible for processing visual information and how it interacts with other areas of the brain.
6. Influence of personality type
The mental activity of extroverts increases significantly when a risky deal “burns out” or they manage to pull off some kind of adventure. On the one hand, this is simply a genetic predisposition of sociable and impulsive people, and on the other - different levels neurotransmitter dopamine in the brain different types personality.
“When it became known that the risky deal was successful, increased activity was traced in two areas of the brain of extroverts: the amygdala (lat. corpus amygdaloidum) and the nucleus accumbens (lat. nucleus accumbens).”
The nucleus accumbens is part of the dopaminergic system, which produces feelings of pleasure and influences motivation and learning. Dopamine, produced in the brains of extroverts, pushes them to do crazy things and gives them the opportunity to fully enjoy the events happening around them. The amygdala, in turn, plays a key role in the formation of emotions and is responsible for processing excitatory and depressive impulses.
Other studies have demonstrated that the most a big difference between introverts and extroverts lies in the processes of processing various stimuli entering the brain. For extroverts, this path is much shorter - exciting factors move through the areas responsible for processing sensory information. For introverts, the trajectory of stimuli is much more complex - they pass through areas associated with the processes of remembering, planning and decision-making.
7. The “total failure” effect
Professor social psychology At Stanford University, Elliot Aronson substantiated the existence of the so-called “Pratfall Effect”. Its essence is that by making mistakes, people like us more.
“The one who never makes mistakes is less liked by others than the one who sometimes does stupid things. Perfection creates distance and an invisible aura of unattainability. That is why the winner is always the one who has at least some flaws.
Elliot Aronson conducted a remarkable experiment that confirmed his hypothesis. A group of participants was asked to listen to two audio recordings made during the interviews. In one of them, a man could be heard knocking over a cup of coffee. When participants were asked which applicant they liked most, everyone voted for the clumsy applicant.”
8. Meditation - recharge your brain
Meditation is useful not only for improving attention and maintaining calm throughout the day. Various psychophysical exercises have many positive effects.
Calm
The more often we meditate, the calmer we become. This statement is somewhat controversial, but quite interesting. As it turned out, the reason for this is the destruction of the nerve endings of the brain. Here's what the prefrontal cortex looks like before and after 20 minutes of meditation:
During meditation, nerve connections are significantly weakened. At the same time, connections between the areas of the brain responsible for reasoning and decision-making, bodily sensations and the fear center, on the contrary, are strengthened. Therefore, experiencing stressful situations, we can evaluate them more rationally.
Creativity
Researchers at Leiden University in the Netherlands, studying goal-oriented and clear-mind meditation, found that participants practicing a style of goal-oriented meditation showed no significant changes in areas of the brain that regulate the process. creative thinking. Those who chose clear-mind meditation far outperformed other participants in subsequent testing.
Memory
Catherine Kerr, Doctor philosophical sciences, employee of the MGH Biomedical Scanning Center (Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging) and Research Center Osher Harvard Medical School, claims that meditation improves many mental abilities, in particular - quick memorization material. The ability to completely disengage from all distractions allows people who practice meditation to concentrate extremely on the task at hand.
9. Exercise - reorganization and training of willpower
Of course, exercise is great for our bodies, but what about our brains? There is exactly the same connection between training and mental activity as there is between training and positive emotions.
"Regular exercise stress can cause significant improvements in human cognitive abilities. As a result of the testing, it turned out that people who are actively involved in sports, unlike couch potatoes, have good memory, quickly make the right decisions, without much difficulty concentrate on completing the task at hand and are able to identify cause-and-effect relationships.”
If you have just started exercising, your brain will perceive this event as nothing other than stress. Rapid heartbeat, shortness of breath, dizziness, convulsions, muscle pain etc. - all these symptoms occur not only in gyms, but also in more extreme life situations. If you have felt something like this before, these unpleasant memories will definitely come to mind.
To protect against stress, the brain produces the protein BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor) during exercise. This is why we feel relaxed and ultimately even happy after exercising. Besides - how defensive reaction in response to stress, the production of endorphins increases:
“Endorphins minimize discomfort during exercise, block pain, and promote feelings of euphoria.”
10. New information slows down the passage of time
Have you ever wished that time didn't fly so fast? Probably more than once. Knowing how a person perceives time, you can artificially slow down its progress.
Absorbing great amount information coming from different organs feelings, our brain structures data in such a way that we can easily use it in the future.
“Since the information perceived by the brain is completely disordered, it must be reorganized and assimilated in a form that is understandable to us. Although the data processing process takes milliseconds, new information takes a little longer to be absorbed by the brain. Thus, it seems to a person that time drags on forever.”
What's more strange is that almost every area of the nervous system is responsible for the perception of time.
When a person receives a lot of information, the brain needs certain time to process it, and the longer this process lasts, the more the passage of time slows down.
When we once again work on painfully familiar material, everything happens exactly the opposite - time flies by almost unnoticed, since we don’t have to put in much mental effort.
Until today, official medicine believed that the adult brain was not capable of renewing itself. He is akin to a machine, and can neither change nor be restored - only... break down. But how then can we explain the numerous cases of so-called “miraculous healings”, which today are difficult to classify as myths, since the facts are too obvious?
Recent brain research has shown how little we know about ourselves and how sparingly we use our capabilities.
We have the power to “reprogram” our “personal computer between the ears”, and through this change and restore our physical body.
Now, in light of this scientific discovery, described in more detail in Sarah Scott's article "The Flexible Brain" and published in Reader's Digest, even skeptics will find it difficult to dismiss the obvious fact: a person is able to change himself - not only psychologically, but also physically level.
Flexible brain
Recent research shows that the least studied human organ has an amazing ability to reconfigure and restore.
One fine day in September 1995, Howard Rocket, a successful 48-year-old entrepreneur, was playing football in a suburb of Toronto. He wanted to intercept the ball, but slipped, fell and hit his head. A minute later, having come to my senses, I felt a headache that became stronger and stronger. Then dark spots flashed before his eyes. He tried not to pay attention to it, hoping that with time everything would pass. However, three weeks later, when Howard was home alone, he suddenly felt that his arms and legs were not obeying him. A sharp pain pierced my head, my vision went dark. He groped his way to the phone, miraculously dialed the ambulance number and lost consciousness.
Howard Rocket suffered a stroke: a blood clot clogged the vessel through which blood flows to the brain stem. Most people die in such a case, but he was saved by doctors who managed to administer a thrombolytic drug in time. However, the prognosis for the future was grim: doctors said his left arm and leg would remain paralyzed. Their muscles were fine, but the parts of the brain that used to control them were seriously damaged. This means you will have to get used to the wheelchair.
But Rocket did not accept the doctors’ verdict and began to intensively engage in physical therapy. He believed that if he worked his leg day after day, then over time the brain would “find an opportunity” to restore control over the muscles. Having learned to stand, he began to fasten his leg to the pedal of an exercise bike and train. The first time he was able to hold out for only 30 seconds, but he continued to practice. It was a kind of exercise for the brain.
12 years later, after thousands of hours of hard practice, Rocket could dance. The doctors were amazed. “It’s just amazing,” says neurocardiologist Robert Willinsky, who saved Rocket’s life. “He is a role model.”
The power of thought
As it turned out, Rocket was right: the brain can indeed be “reconfigured” in such a way that it replenishes the functions of failed areas. Until recently, most practicing doctors considered this idea utopian. They were sure that the adult brain is like a machine: it can neither change nor grow - it can only break down. However, over the past few decades, brain scanning techniques such as positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) have allowed scientists to observe this organ in action. They were now convinced that the traditional view of the brain was wrong.
If one part of the brain is damaged, especially in the cortex (the thin outer layer of the brain responsible for processing incoming information and regulating movement), then other parts of the brain can eventually take over its function. However, this requires painstaking work, which sometimes takes years. However, scientists talk about the plasticity of neural structures, that intense mental and physical exercise can change the brain at a structural level. “When a person thinks, the brain’s hardware is updated,” says Toronto psychiatrist Norman Doidge.
Neurophysiologist Richard Davidson from the University of Wisconsin (USA) demonstrated the effectiveness of this therapy by conducting an experiment with meditation, a type of mental exercise. He measured the brain activity of Buddhist monks while they engaged in “compassion” meditation, which creates feelings of love for all living things, and found a significant difference between novices and experienced monks. The latter generated powerful gamma waves, which contribute to the expansion of consciousness.
Meditation can also have a profound effect on our physical sensations, such as our perception of pain. Melissa Monroe, a former Canadian bodybuilding champion, learned at age 30 that a lump in her throat the size of a chicken egg was malignant Hodgkin lymphoma. The disease turned out to be so advanced that doctors told her: “You have cancer all over your body, from head to toe,” and determined that she had three months to live.
However, Melissa Monroe began to fight, despite the fact that the pain from the tumors that pressed on her internal organs was unbearable even for her, an athlete accustomed to working at the limit of her physical capabilities. She turned to psychiatrist Tatyana Melnik for help, who taught her how to “tune” herself to relieve pain.
Pain is a physical sensation, Melnik explained, but if you react to it emotionally, it will only intensify. The psychiatrist advised Melissa to take the pain for granted: “Don’t rate it as very or not very severe; just live with her.”
By mentally tuning herself in this way, Monroe learned to cope with her reaction to the sensation of pain: she felt it, but was no longer dependent on it. “It was something that I experience,” she says, “but it didn’t seem to happen to me. I abstracted myself from the pain and didn’t let it twist me.”
Monroe defied fate and began intensive chemotherapy. After one complex procedure, when she returned home, she even lost consciousness and came to her senses only thanks to her sister, who gave her chest compressions and artificial respiration. And in 2006, it was 6 years since doctors declared her cancer-free. And she continues to meditate.
New discoveries
How can thoughts or exercise change the brain?
It turns out that they can influence the activity of genes. Research conducted in the 1980s and 1990s shows that genes can be turned on or off during learning of other mental or physical activities. It is not yet known exactly how this happens, but Dr. Doidge states: “When we think about the same thing over and over again, certain genes are turned on and begin to produce corresponding proteins, so that the structure of neurons changes and the number of connections between them increases.” . In other words, the communication capabilities of neurons increase.
New neurons can also form in the brain. In the laboratory of the University of Lethbridge in the Canadian province of Alberta, neuroscientist Brian Kolb and his colleagues demonstrated this in rats by causing a cerebrovascular accident that led to brain damage. It turned out that when animals were injected with a growth factor, they not only formed new neurons, but also replenished structurally and functionally damaged areas of the brain.
Scientists made another stunning discovery: after two weeks, newly formed brain cells moved to the area of damage and, so to speak, awaited further orders. And if these cells are properly stimulated, they begin to function, restoring lost abilities, such as controlling the movement of limbs.
The work Kolb has done shows how important rehabilitation is for the damaged brain. Today, scientists are trying to find out whether the stimulation provided by physical and mental rehabilitation can increase the production of new brain cells and speed up the healing process.
One of the “incubators” of neurons is the hippocampus, which plays a key role in memory. In one study, researchers at the University of Toronto used chemical tags to track the movement of naturally occurring brain cells in healthy mice. These mice were trained to swim to a fixed platform, and eventually, after numerous attempts, the mice remembered its location. When the brains of these mice were later studied, they found that the newly formed neurons were used to perform a memory task - the labeled cells were concentrated in “incubators” of the hippocampus.
The scientists also found that the newly formed neurons began to improve memory after just a month. According to neuroscientist Paul Frankland, who led the work, the study showed that the number of new brain cells depends on the environment. Cocaine use and stress, for example, weaken their education, while jogging and studying strengthen them.
Change the life
What scientists call neural plasticity, 21-year-old Ian Bradley simply calls hope. In seventh grade, he still couldn’t read, but wrote letters and numbers like a first grader. “I thought I was a fool,” he said. Throughout elementary school, his mother, Mary, spent hours reading textbooks and helping him with his written homework.
And then Bradley's father heard about Arrowsmith School. Its founder, Barbara Arrowsmith-Young, also had problems with learning disabilities at one time. And then she came up with mental exercises with which she could overcome her “inferiority.” She later developed new exercises that could help people with similar disabilities. Today, Arrowsmith programs are taught throughout North America.
Bradley spent three years in such a school, where he again and again performed exercises to train memory and attention, for example, making pairs of letters and their corresponding symbols. “It was terribly tiring,” he says. However, by the end of the course, he was already reading at an eighth-grade level. And today, a recent high school graduate whose grades improved so much that he was awarded an honorable mention in the 11th grade dreams of becoming a pilot. “My life used to be so dull,” he says. “And now I have a sky-high goal.”
New discoveries in the field of neuroscience offer hope for many: those suffering from the effects of stroke, those struggling with chronic pain, and young people with learning disabilities.
“So far, we have only been able to discover the mechanisms by which the brain can change,” says neurosurgeon Andres Lozano, one of those who helped save Howard Rocket.
Today, doctors and scientists are beginning to understand that the entrepreneur from Toronto who did not want to submit to the disease turned out to be right after all. Repeated repetition of exercises - both mental and physical - can change your brain. And your life too.
Article from Reader's Digest magazine
