The new technology, EEG Seizure Detection, was a collaboration between UCC’s Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering and the School of Medicine involving Dr Stephen Faul, Dr Andrey Temko, Dr Liam Marnane, Dr Gordon Lightbody and Dr Geraldine Boylan. More recently, her cross disciplinary approach helped establish a Newborn Brain Research Group in Cork, which helps scientists, clinicians and engineers come together to come up with solutions for problems facing newborns.
the marketplace, because of its potentially dangerous side effects. His research has also led to the formation of spin-off companies such as Genset and Biontrack.
In this age of diet-induced obesity, it may seem counter-intuitive that fats are good for your brain. However, researchers have found Detection of seizures in babies could eliminate some mental that fish oils, particularly the health problems in later life. Omega 3s can help maintain healthy brains with age. Dr Geraldine Boylan, below, and her group has developed Every cell in your body is lined seizure detection technology that is easy to use. with a thin membrane composed No pain no gain of fats and proteins. With age, Pain is important. Not just for drill these membranes lose their structural integrity, sergeants trying to school naive soldiers. But, like saggy elastic bands and this means that also for us to help avoid danger, and alert us to brain cells don’t function as well as they used to. illnesses. In Ireland, one in eight people suffer So by taking fish oil supplements, it’s thought from chronic pain forcing absence from work, you can help fortify your brain cell’s outer costing about three million work days. And linings and help them function better with age. almost one in six people who suffer from chronic Or at least that’s what people used to think. pain have lost their job because of the condition. More recently, researchers in Trinity College SFI funded Dr David Finn is trying to discover led by Professor Marina Lynch have discovered better ways of treating such chronic and stressthat fatty acids have other properties which can related pain. help your brain age better. Professor Lynch and Usually when scientists think of pain, they her team have been studying a molecule termed think of the opoid system. You may be familiar eicosapentaenoic acid or EPA for short. with the opoid system after you or your friends After taking a couple of molecular were given morphine to treat a chronic painful medications, EPA can become one of the hopeful Omega-3 injury. Neurofen, the once over-the-counter pain relief drug is polyunsaturated fatty acids which we’re told we should eat a member of the opoid family. Although opiates are powerful more of. However, unlike the other fatty acids, EPA isn’t a pain-relievers, and pleasure inducers, they also have addictive pivotal part of the cell’s membranes. This made people wonder properties. For this reason they are regulated more tightly than how exactly it helps your brain to age. paracetomol for example. Prof Lynch’s group decided to study the functions of EPA, Recently we’ve recognised that another system, the and fed it to very old rodents to see how it affected their brains. cannabinoid system is important for pain modulation. And yes, They discovered that EPA actually helped dampen down the the cannabinoid system is the same pathway that responds to hyperactive and problematic neuro-inflammatory response marijuana or hash, which is why some people propose the drug associated with aging. They found reduced numbers of neuroshould be legalised to treat people suffering from chronic pain. immune cells in the brains of the aged rats. Prof Lynch suggests However, that is not the focus of Dr Finn’s research. that the uncontrollable misfiring of micro-glia that release Instead he’s been looking at how endogenous cannabinoids, dangerous cytotoxic molecules may contribute to problems in produced by your own brain, are increased during times of the aged-brains. So if EPA can reduce neuroinflammation with stress. Dr Finn has discovered that cannabinoids are actually age, it may actually also improve brain function. vital for mediating pain responses when you are subjected to physiological stressors. And it appears that the cannabinoi ?????????????e?????????????????????????????????????I?????????????????????????????????????Q????????????????????????????????????!?????I?????? ?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
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