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communication between neurons by fields weak electrical

The brain, whether awake, as if asleep, has a lot of electrical activity, and not just individual signals emitted by a neuron or another when they communicate with each other. In fact, the brain is surrounded by innumerable overlapping electric fields generated by the activity of neural circuits of neurons that communicate. A new study reveals these fields are much more important than previously thought. It is possible that, in fact, represent an additional form of neuronal communication.

In other words, neurons generated extracellular fields but these fields fed back to neurons and alter their behavior, although the neurons are not physically connected. So far, it was believed that direct neuronal communication channel was restricted to synapses.

The team discovered by neuroscientist Costas Anastassiou California Institute of Technology (Caltech), suggests the existence of other media-independent neuronal synapses through extracellular space.

extracellular electric fields appear throughout the brain. Are particularly strong in specific brain regions as the hippocampus, which participates in the creation of memories, and the neocortex, the area where memories are stored long term. The constant fluctuations of these fields extracellular are the hallmark of all brains in a good state of any complex organism, and its absence is a clear sign that the brain is in a deep coma or even death.

The discovery made in this study raises an intriguing question: Could some external electric fields have similar effects on the brain? Physics states that any external field can reach the neuronal membrane. "Although the effect of externally imposed fields also depend on the state of the brain," he qualifies Anastassiou. The ability of an externally imposed field may have to influence the brain also depends on the specific brain area in which impinges. Marga