Can the Nervous System Be Hacked? - NYTimes.com - 0 views
www.nytimes.com/...-nervous-system-be-hacked.html
bioengineering brain neurocommunication neurodevelopment neurogrowth neurology neuroscience neurotechnology normonique pychology technology
shared by normonique on 29 Jun 14
- Cached
-
But communication between nerves and the immune system was considered impossible, according to the scientific consensus in 1998.
-
It would have been “inconceivable,” he added, to propose that nerves were directly interacting with immune cells.
-
electrical pulses to the rat’s exposed vagus nerve. He stitched the cut closed and gave the rat a bacterial toxin known to promote the production of tumor necrosis factor, or T.N.F., a protein that triggers inflammation in animals, including humans.
- ...7 more annotations...
-
-
the nervous system was like a computer terminal through which you could deliver commands to stop a problem,
-
-
Inflammatory afflictions like rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn’s disease are currently treated with drugs — painkillers, steroids and what are known as biologics, or genetically engineered proteins. But such medicines, Tracey pointed out, are often expensive, hard to administer, variable in their efficacy and sometimes accompanied by lethal side effects.
-
His work seemed to indicate that electricity delivered to the vagus nerve in just the right intensity and at precise intervals could reproduce a drug’s therapeutic — in this case, anti-inflammatory — reaction. His subsequent research would also show that it could do so more effectively and with minimal health risks.