Control of neuronal networks and cognitive behaviour by deep brain, transcranial and optogenetic stimulation

你的大脑不断地进行总结，权衡过去的经验和当前的情况，以决定如何表现得最好。不幸的是，患有精神分裂症等脑部疾病的患者很难处理这些我们大多数人认为理所当然的决定；他们大脑不同部分的电活动变得微妙地不协调，以至于很难看到树木的树木。这个项目将使用旨在控制大脑电信号的刺激技术(非常小心-如果它对你做了你不会注意到)，看看我们是否可以在重要时刻重新协调大脑活动，比如在决策期间。睡眠期间的大脑活动也很重要，通常反映了之前的事件。这反映了大脑“整理”最近的想法，为长期存储准备有用的信息。一夜睡眠不佳往往伴随着迟钝的思绪，脑部疾病通常会损害睡眠。因此，我们还将在睡眠期间使用大脑刺激，看看这是否可以促进有效的决策。很难设计出治疗思维过程受损的药物。我们的研究将开发新的技术--可能与未来的药物相结合--可以用于治疗精神分裂症和相关疾病的思维障碍。

Your brain is constantly doing sums, weighing-up past experience and the current situation in order to decide how best to behave. Unfortunately, patients with brain diseases like schizophrenia have trouble coping with these decisions that most of us take for granted; electrical activity in different parts of their brains becomes subtly uncoordinated, making it difficult to see the wood for the trees. This project will use stimulation techniques designed to control the brain‘s electrical signalling (very carefully - you wouldn‘t notice if it was done to you) to see if we can re-coordinate brain activity at important times, such as during decisions. Brain activity during sleep is also important, often mirroring previous events. This reflects the brain ‘sorting out‘ recent thoughts, preparing useful information for long term storage. A bad night‘s sleep is often followed by sluggish thoughts, and sleep is commonly impaired in brain disease. We will therefore also use brain stimulation during sleep to see if that can boost efficient decision-making. It is difficult to design drugs to treat impaired thought processes. Our research will develop new techniques that - potentially in combination with future drugs - can be used to treat thought disorders in schizophrenia and related diseases.