A new University of Michigan study, which received funding from the National Institutes of Health and the Alzheimer’s Association, suggests these neurons are vital to evolutionary survival. Nature has guarded and amplified them through countless generations, helping mammals instinctively know where they are in their environments.
Charles Darwin first described the remarkable ability of most species to know where they are even without external cues and figure out a direct path to their destination. He called this “dead reckoning.” But this ability to seamlessly navigate between familiar locations is impaired in people who suffer damage to a brain region called the retrosplenial cortex.
“The retrosplenial cortex functions as a subconscious GPS system for our brains. It has specialized neurons that calculate what direction we need to go in to head towards our desired destination,” said Omar Ahmed, U-M associate professor of psychology and senior author of the study.
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“We see neurons in the human brain that physically look like the specialized retrosplenial neurons seen in other species. By understanding how these neurons change in people with Alzheimer’s disease we can work towards targeted therapies to repair the neurons,” Ahmed said.
In addition to Ahmed and Brooks, study co-authors are Izabela Jedrasiak-Cape, Chloe Rybicki-Kler and Tyler Ekins.
Read the complete article in Michigan News
