An emergency brake in the brain
Wednesday, November 26, 2008 - 10:42
in Health & Medicine
Brain researchers at the University of Oslo in Norway have penetrated deeply into the innermost secrets of the brain to find out how brain cells can survive a stroke. Strokes are usually caused by occlusion of one of the blood vessels in the brain. When blood is prevented from supplying vital oxygen and energy to the brain cells, their electrochemical balance is upset, and they cause damage to themselves and to the surrounding brain cells before they collapse and die. Often this affects the memory centre, the hippocampus, where the cells are particularly vulnerable.