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. bcjdjsndon · 1790844350 · focus · HN ↗

         Does make me worry about the competence of scientists that they make that mistake.

         1. coldtea · 1790845460 · focus · HN ↗

            Given that this was the scientific consensus, "the competence of scientists that they make that mistake" compared to whom? Laymen? I'd still bet on the scientists.

            If there's a real concern is not about "the competence of scientists that they make that mistake", but about the certainty of our grasp of the scientific facts in general.

            It's not that those scientists were incompetent.

            It's more like "science in general doesn't know as much as solidly as we'd like to think" about the matter.

            1. eviks · 1790847873 · focus · HN ↗

               Compared to competent scientists

               1. jibalt · 1790850037 · focus · HN ↗

                  "the competence of scientists compared to competent scientists" is incoherent and, well, incompetent at multiple levels in this context.

                  1. jibalt · 1790883451 · focus · HN ↗

                     Yet more incompetence (and quite a case of projection) in the response ... as the GP made clear, the context isn't about a comparison between different groups of scientists. The GGP made a sweeping generalization about the entire community of scientists -- as the GP said, this was the scientific consensus. There wasn't some separate group of "competent scientists" who believed that "junk DNA" wasn't junk, as there was no evidence that it wasn't. One is not competent merely by virtue of making a baseless claim. The fact is that the scientists who subscribed to the consensus were generally competent, as scientists generally are ... far more competent, certainly, than bozos making absurdly ignorant and cognitively inept claims that lack of knowledge of the function of "junk DNA" was an indication of scientific incompetence as opposed to some other group of people who were competent scientists.

                     I won't respond further to such cluelessness.

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