A team led by researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania has used advanced techniques to show that, in a key memory region of the brain called the hippocampus, immature, plastic neurons are present in significant numbers throughout the human lifespan. The findings, published this month in Nature, hope to resolve a long-running controversy over the existence of «adult neurogenesis»—the production of new immature neurons in the mature human brain. The discovery also paves the way for the deeper study of adult neurogenesis and its roles in memory, mood, behavior, and brain disorders.
Discovery of molecular signatures of immature neurons in human brain provides new insights into brain plasticity
A team led by researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania has used advanced techniques to show that, in a key memory region of the brain called the hippocampus, immature, plastic neurons are present in significant numbers throughout the human lifespan. The findings, published this month in Nature, hope to resolve a long-running controversy over the existence of "adult neurogenesis"—the production of new immature neurons in the mature human brain. The discovery also paves the way for the deeper study of adult neurogenesis and its roles in memory, mood, behavior, and brain disorders.