Cobbers on the Brain

What does that even mean – “A connection between autism and concussions?” Well, recently I’ve learned about the neurochemistry behind what occurs in the brains of autistic patients and found that the root of the problem is simply too many networks, signals, or connections in the brain, which leads to overstimulation of the brain. Obviously that’s very simplified, but at the root that is the problem.
In the case of a concussion, the root cause is a little broader. The trauma the brain experiences leads to many things going wrong. These include oxidative stress and anatomical deficiencies in the structure of the neurons. Specifically, the axons of the neuron are literally “broken,” which leads to a lack of networking in the brain and, subsequently, things going wrong in the longterm if the concussive patient isn’t given adequate rehabilitation time.
There’s the connection – the brains of patients with autism and those experiencing concussions are basically the opposite, in terms of axonal connections. Interesting, right? Well, recently, I’ve done research in the area of axonal sprouting and targeting the neurochemical pathway – PI3K-AKT – that is involved in autism. If this pathway is “turned on” too often, or not inhibited enough, autistic behaviors are observed in test subjects. However, a molecule responsible for inhibiting this pathway – phosphate and tensin homolog (PTEN) – is also an interest of mine in potentially treating brain injuries like concussions. If PTEN can be inhibited, the negative outcomes of a concussion can be better controlled. Below is a simplified schematic outlining this idea.

Following binding of a ligand to the tyrosine kinase receptor on the membrane of the cell, PTEN inhibits PI3K signaling by dephosphorylating the lipid signaling intermediate PIP(3), which is a necessary factor in the communication between PI3K and AKT. This dephosphorylation prevents the pathway from promoting cell survival and inhibiting apoptosis, or programmed cell death.
However, if PTEN is inhibited, PI3K-AKT is turned on even more, which will lead to more axonal sprouting and more networking. So, would this PTEN inhibition lead to autistic behaviors, then? Or would a potential treatment for concussion lead to promising results with little drawbacks? That’s a question that has yet to be answered. But, like many areas of neuroscience, it interests me significantly. Obviously this idea that autism and concussions are somehow related is very broad and not understood well, but nonetheless, I believe it deserves some attention.
 

How to sum up my semester of Neurochemistry? I’m not exactly sure… There needs to be more research done… My understanding of it is…

This class was unlike any other that I’ve taken so far. Being a science major you mostly get to learn what other people have already discovered. Theories and laws that have been researched and proven for years. Even in lab I do experiments that I already know what I should be getting.

Neuroscience is a very new field. There is a lot of knowledge about it, but there is so much more that we don’t know. Many of the papers we read and theories we looked at were very recent. A lot of times we found ourselves at a roadblock where we really couldn’t find any more information because it wasn’t out there. There wasn’t enough research on the topic to solidify any facts. There could be a lot of theories or potential, but wasn’t proven yet.

That was another cool part of all the research that we did, we got to hypothesize our own ideas. We could look at a broad spectrum of possibilities and make our own connections. Were they always correct? Maybe not. The words, “My understanding” or “I think” were never frowned upon in this class, they were encouraged. If the best scientists in the world couldn’t figure it out exactly, then why couldn’t we at least take a stab at it?

If you read a lot of articles in science you know how difficult it is to follow sometimes. There are a lot of acronyms and a lot of words that you don’t really know. There were many times I would read a paragraph, stop to think about it, and have no idea what I just read. Even walking into class I’d have paragraphs highlighted with things I didn’t understand. I became so thankful for the people in my class. 

I got to meet an almost entirely new group of people. At a small school like Concordia there isn’t a ton of opportunity to take classes with people who aren’t the same age other than the core credits. Neurochemistry is a capstone class that is taken senior year, considering I am at “senior status” even though I am a junior, I got to take a class with the people I normally just see around the science building.

There were so many different minds and personalities in our small, 14 person class. It was very interesting to hear other people’s perspectives, depending on how they grew up. Every Friday we discussed the issues surrounding our topic that week. For example, what is the cause of Alzheimer’s? Is there a better way to treat it? It seemed that every week it came back to the culture of the busy American’s.

 If only we would slow down, take some time to look around. This was something we all had in common. Being very driven, success seeking Cobbers we are pretty much always on the go. FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) is a real thing, fear of missing opportunities, fear of missing fun, and even fear of missing points. A lot of the damage came from oxidative stress. As we are always on the search for the next best thing, the next best cure, maybe it could all be solved by slowing down?

We talked a lot about death and sick people, but not in a sad way. We thought about spending more time with family and friends, making the years count instead of counting the years. As great as finding a cure would be all of us are a few years from being able to be the one who does that, so instead it was mostly about prevention and how to deal with the disease.

So what did I do in my semester of neurochemistry? I got a lot better at reading and communicating science. I figured out how to break down pictures and diagrams into an understandable way. I spent a lot of time listening and understanding other’s opinions. The most valuable lesson I learned from neurochemistry though didn’t have a lot to do with science. This course was rigorous and difficult, but take the time to slow down. The busy life style is a part of our culture and if you don’t keep up you might not make it, but it is important to make time for more than just work. It may save you in the end.

Concordia College implements a capstone course into student’s coursework. It is stated to reinforce the connection between liberal learning and various academic disciplines. Neurochemistry was my capstone course, and I felt it met or exceeded all the exceptions to be called a capstone class.
Instill a love for learning
By taking neurochemistry, it has increased my interest in different areas of study. When I first signed up for the class, I thought it would be another class where the teacher teaches and the student take notes and listen. It was also interesting how it did not have a lab, since every chemistry course I took here had a lab with the lecture.
On day 1, my exceptions were completely thrown out. The class was orientated to helping each other learn. The beginning few weeks had students post on different synapse and signaling molecules. We each had to contribute something to our course wiki page. The fun part was when we got into reading different neurological disease. Mondays had us talk about the paper, and figure what we did not know for “speed dating” on Wednesdays. Friday had us just talk about anything related to the topic of the week. This classroom format was unique and installed a new way for me to learn.
The love of learning also comes from how each of us had to help one another to be able to succeed in this class. The collection of ideas from each other helped pushed thinking into a new aspect, in ways I would never have thought of.
Develop foundational skills and transferable intellectual capacities
Most articles we read each week was a hot topic in health. They included Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s, autism, concussions, and obesity. All of these topics have real world application due to the increase of them in recent years. Concussions have become relevant due to Will Smith’s movie “Concussion” and how retired NFL stars have been seen with chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). All of the topics were known previously before reading the articles, but the science behind how these topics were not uncovered until taking this class.
The knowledge we learned was also transferred to our weekly blog posts on the topic. We were able to condense the article and spread it to the public. Our public service announcement (PSA), also helped spread awareness of a hot topic of our choosing. Both activities helped reinforce our thinking and to be able to tell the public about it.
Develop an understanding of disciplinary, interdisciplinary and intercultural perspectives and their connections
Even though this class was a chemistry class, it was relatable to other disciplinary fields too. Some articles had biological pathways, psychology with animal studies, and English with the blogs. This class presented ideas from different fields in connection with chemistry. This class being neurochemistry was related to neuroscience as well. The study of the central nervous system was always relevant due to these diseases being in the brain.
 
Cultivate an examined cultural, ethical, physical and spiritual self-understanding
From taking this class, I learned how diverse chemistry can be. With the combination of different disciplinary fields in this course, I learned how they might be able to correlate together to find cures for different diseases. By understanding different pathways from articles in previous weeks, I was able to understand better how they relate to pathways in future articles. It showed me how my area of study could be used in different aspects of the learning.
 
Encourage responsible participation in the world (BREW)
By taking this class, it helped me think critically in other areas besides chemistry. I also learned how different areas of study can correlate with each other to do good. It made me think more critically about the topics we discussed. Marijuana, which is a schedule 1 drug, has shown to be effective in treating different diseases. The stigma of it still clouds people’s ideas on it.
This class has helped me engage with different aspects of studies, which I would have never known about, or would have thought about.