Patients in their 60s and 70s have regained working memory equivalent to those in their twenties. At the origin of this feat, the cerebral electrical stimulation experienced by researchers at Boston University in the United States. The “anti-aging” effect of this method was observed 50 minutes after the end of the stimulation, they explain in their study published in nature neuroscience.
Working memory is the ability to retain short-term information. This temporary storage area of the brain is involved in solving problems, mathematical calculations or even in decision-making. This working memory has a capacity that decreases with aging.
The researchers looked at brain waves from two brain regions involved in working memory – the temporal and prefrontal brain regions.
“The brain is like an orchestra conductor and it uses low frequency rhythms [ondes cérébrales] to communicate information,” Dr. Reinhart told BBC News. However, with age, the waves become out of sync, like musicians producing a disjointed performance, explain the researchers.
The Americans therefore sought to resynchronize and reinforce the brain waves via electrical stimulation. They first recorded the patients’ brain waves with an electroencephalogram without stimulation and then with brain electrical stimulation. The process used was high definition transcranial alternating current.
For the experiment they recruited a group of 42 people aged 60-70 and another group of 42 people in their twenties. All have all played a game where it was necessary to distinguish the differences between images shown successively. The group of young people were faster and more precise in their answers. But with brain stimulation, the older group performed better.
A treatment avenue to explore
While these results are encouraging, the authors acknowledge that the tests were only conducted on a limited number of people who were in good health. Further work is therefore needed before electrical stimulation can be considered as treatment track for brain disordersas’autism Where dementia.
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