Thread

1. randomImmigrant · 1790804308 · focus · HN ↗

   For context, the debate in the field has been whether these are epiphenomena of the actual neuronal activity, or a meaningful driver of further activity.

   I don’t think these studies quite rest the case. As Buzsaki comments in the article, the action is in the cells to create these waves. Do the waves themselves get measured and impact what happens next? The issue at hand is: synaptic currents are stronger and we know neurons respond to them. The wave behavior is in the extracellular fluid as well, and that part we have evidence neurons don’t respond much to.

   That said, thing the article doesn’t talk about is astrocytes. Especially in the cortex, most synapses are tripartite. There’s an astrocytic end foot that sheathes the synapse and regulates how much of the bulk extracellular space has access to the synapse. And one astrocyte can touch thousands of synapses and in humans, hundreds of thousands. They also form a syncitium, through gap junctions/electrical synapses.

   Do astrocytes respond to the extracellular wave behavior, which potentially changes the extent and behavior of the syncitium, and thus impact the neurons they touch?

   That’s still an open question but that’s what I’d be interested to find out more about.

   1. monideas · 1790834913 · focus · HN ↗

      Reminds me of when non-coding DNA was thought to be useless, it was labeled “Junk DNA”, and then it was realized it played a role in regulating gene expression.

      1. randomImmigrant · 1790867046 · focus · HN ↗

         That was at least a relatively short lived belief. That glia, the other half of brain cells, got ignored and relegated to “support” for so long is, to my mind, the worse mistake: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.quantamagazine.org&#x2F;these-cells-spark-electricity-in-the-brain-theyre-not-neurons-20231018&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.quantamagazine.org&#x2F;these-cells-spark-electricity...

         That said, science wouldn’t need to be self-correcting if it was always right.

         Science is like a group of people with lights of varying strength exploring a dense forest at night. We often mix up shadows and caves and rocks and animals and people… there’s a lot of room for misinterpretation. To demand otherwise, to demand some kind of mistake free march in good order as if we’re on a brightly lit field, is to ignore that we are… ingnorant.

Unofficial Hacker News client; not affiliated with Y Combinator.