Memory: a revolutionary treatment for mental health disorders and neurodegeneration? 🧠👇 BU_Tweets memory interview diversity mentalhealth neuroscience
Interview conducted by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Nov 2 2022 Thought LeadersDr. Steve RamirezAssistant Professor, Psychological and Brain SciencesBoston University In this interview, we speak to Dr. Steve Ramirez from Boston University about his latest neuroscience research that investigated the power of our memories and how, one day, we could use their power to potentially treat mental health disorders.
Neuroscience is relatively young compared to physics or math, which has a few thousand years ahead of us. The progress has been tremendous, but it is just the tip of the iceberg, as the human brain has 86 billion brain cells and more than a hundred trillion connections. It is astonishing the computational power that it is capable of. The fact that we can go in and use tools now to eavesdrop on the brain as thoughts and feelings happen is a testament to where modern neuroscience is.
If a memory changes ever so slightly each time we recall it, is there a possibility that if we recalled a significant memory enough, it would one day end up being a different memory entirely? There is a saying that you cannot step in the same river twice. I think it is true with memory, where you cannot recall the same memory twice; some bits and pieces are warped and updated or susceptible to modification each time we recall it.
Memories can be remarkably consistent, but some imperfections and the details that can be warped might really matter. Finally, we wanted to dive into their genome and ask, "Was there anything genetically about positive and negative experiences that was different? Was it just all memory, and there was no real distinguishing factor of positive or negative?" We were really excited when we looked at the level of the genome and the molecular fingerprints that positive or negative memories leave behind; they also seem to be largely different.
Are you hopeful that with continued research, we will one day be able to use the brain to treat mental health disorders such as PTSD and depression? What would this mean not only for healthcare settings, but for the millions of people living with poor mental health? As long as you have a brain, mental health matters. The neural fingerprint that we have is wildly unique to us.
Hopefully, medicine will have evolved where we look at the brain and the way we look at disorders, and we will look at approaches and say, "How did we survive using these crude approaches to technology?" I hope that our approach to mental health and treating the brain in an individual in 2000 years looks nothing like what it looks like today because we are just so much more advanced in how we treat an individual.
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