Cobbers on the Brain

Many of the skills I’ve learned throughout college are skills I thought I already knew. Courses such as Christianity and Religious Diversity, Social Psychology, Organismal Biology and Philosophy of Art, among many others, have taught me how to think critically about different problems and the world itself. Our Neurochemistry course has undoubtedly improved my critical thinking skills as well- group discussions centered around research implications every week and exams that required synthesizing ideas instead of memorizing information have given me invaluable practice for processing and working with concepts in the moment. The biggest thing I’ve learned from this course, however, is how to learn itself. As a byproduct, this has exponentially increased my confidence in the scientific field.

At the beginning of the course, I relied on the learning strategies that have always been enough in the past, and quickly realized that I would need to adopt new methods to succeed. Usually, I would copy down notes from lecture, read the textbook, and go through it all over and over before an exam. This had worked great for me previously, but since there weren’t any true lectures in the course, this process need to be replaced with utilizing new resources. These included information that my classmates had shared and learning how to conduct my own background research.

Neurochemistry was also the first time that I was pushed to understand research articles from top to bottom; this was a learning curve for me because I was used to just skimming the introduction and discussion of articles, but I was surprised by how much I was able to comprehend on my own by the end of course. While it definitely required more time and effort, the structure of this course taught me how to better integrate information into my foundation of knowledge, instead of passively absorbing content. More specific skills that I’ve also taken away from the course include pulling information together from various sources and communicating it in an effective way to different audiences. 

As my understanding and appreciation for neuroscience has grown since I began my studies in the field last year, I’ve slowly begun to see themes in the inner workings of the brain. Through investigating a diverse mix of neurological conditions/diseases and the cellular processes that underlie them, our neurochemistry course in particular has helped me piece together some overarching patterns. Interestingly, one of these themes is relevant on a larger scale, including life itself: balance. 

The Theme of Balance Throughout Different Neurological Disorders

On a biological level, this idea of balance is conceptualized as homeostasis, and as I learned in this course, loss of homeostasis can lead to many neurological disorders. The functioning of our brain is very tightly controlled, with many feedback loops and mechanisms for auto-regulation. An example that demonstrates how disruption of excitation/inhibition balance can contribute to pathophysiology – often meaning disruptions in glutamate or GABA signaling, the main excitatory and inhibitory neurotransmitters in the brain – is anxiety.

In general, overabundance of glutamate and low levels of GABA can lead to an anxiety response, with many underlying mechanisms and areas involved that are responsible for this happening. As I learned while conducting research for the course, one of these mechanisms involve GABAergic signaling in the amygdala; these circuits normally work to inhibit the amygdala’s interaction with stress, but chronic stress may cause the networks to reduce, lowering amount of inhibition and increasing anxiety as a result. Overexpression of glutamate is thought to contribute to many other disorders as well, such as autism spectrum disorder and schizophrenia, while underexpression has been indicated in obsessive-compulsive disorder. Another type of imbalance between orexigenic and anorexigenic peptides can promote metabolic syndrome, essentially increasing food intake while decreasing energy expenditure. 

In attempt to resolve certain disruptions to homeostasis, the brain can implement compensatory mechanisms that counteract the disruption. Behavioral tolerance after consistent drug use is an example of this; through dopamine-mediated pairing of stimuli, the brain implements effects opposite of the drug when exposed to the associated cue, and this process can contribute to drug overdose and relapse. Compensatory mechanisms can even be seen after Traumatic Brain Injury, where ionic pumps shift into overdrive and cause hyperglycolysis in an effort to restore ionic and cellular homeostasis that were disturbed from the initial biomechanical blow to the head. 

While these connections may seem a bit out of context as a whole, balance has always been a significant challenge in my own life, and as a result it has become a major value. More than just juggling everyday priorities, I’m still figuring out how to manage my own levels of excitation and inhibition. Without constant and consistent effort, I quickly fall into patterns that only harm myself and perpetuate a cycle of dysregulation that can be extremely difficult to break out of. I would guess that in some way or another, many people can relate to this feeling of being out of control when it comes to regulating themselves or their lives. 

Of course, the etiology of these disorders are more complex than ‘imbalances in the brain’, as the common rhetoric often goes, but understanding that they can stem from impairments to our brain’s mechanisms for maintaining balance can ultimately help remove stigma and blame from the individual. Especially for conditions such as metabolic disorder, where many people have essentially been told that their struggles are completely due to their actions, learning the physiological reasons for what they are dealing with might actually allow them to find ways forward through education and empowerment.

Considering that many mental health and neurological disorders involve an aspect of difficulties with self-regulation on a behavioral level as well as a physiological one, treatment plans may often benefit from a multi-dimensional approach. To me, this stresses the importance of integrating the psychological and neurological fields as much as possible; as someone who is interested in a mental-health related career, I intend to do just that, equipped with the skills I’ve gained from our Neurochemistry course. 

If you are anything like me, the time around finals is when your immune system goes extinct. This happens every year during mid December for me. Finals start approaching and stress levels begin to rise. I have tried a variety of different things to do to avoid getting sick, but nothing has seemed to work. A recent article that we discussed in class offered a potential therapy or “treatment” to possibly help prevent this. This therapy is music.

In the article, music is talked about like it’s a special drug. The reading discussed how music helps lower stress levels and improve immune system markers. Studies showed cortisol levels before and after the listening of music. The results showed a significant decrease in cortisol. This lowers stress as cortisol represents stress levels. One musical aspect researchers looked at was group drumming. The drumming allowed for participants to engage in a rhythm based beat together. Lymphocyte numbers increased as well as immune system markers such as IL-6 during this engagement. The article also referenced positive feedback after participating in group singing. During group singing, s-Iga concentrations rose by a drastic amount.

Is it Really Music?

One big question that was common throughout the whole class was the actual power of music. In many of these studies, there were other contributing factors that may have lead to the positive feedback. Examples of the singing and group drumming are the social aspects of those. While drumming in a group or singing with your choir, you are surrounded by people who I would assume you like to be around. So we question whether it’s the actual music or the environment. In many of the individual research that our class performs, many of them hinted that music does in fact improve your stress levels by a large margin over everything else. Me being the sports junky I am would assume that playing a game of baseball would provide the same benefits as an individual singing in the choir. This however has been overturned and said that music is still much more effective when it comes to reducing stress.

Still a Right Fit for You

A large amount of these studies have to deal with classical music. Studies often involve singing or listening to classical music. For many of you, classical music may not be your type. Although more research needs to be done, research still hints at it doesn’t matter whether or not you like the music. Engaging in classical music will still perhaps benefit you whether you like the genre or not. 

With finals time approaching, try something new this year. If you struggle with stress and see a decline in your immune system then you should try putting some music on. Through these studies, you can see the positive impact either listening or singing to music can play on your body. 

Registration for the fall of 2021 began during end of spring semester in 2020. To fulfill my PEAK requirements at Concordia, I decided I would sign up for Neurochemistry. As a chemistry major, I really was not looking forward to the class if I am being honest. I did not know much about the brain and felt as if I would be behind throughout the whole semester. When the semester was about to begin, Concordia sent out a notice telling students that they did not have to do two PEAKS. I had already had my one PEAK credit, so dropping neurochemistry crossed my mind. I kept going back and forth and finally felt the motivation to try something new and stay enrolled. When classes began, I was behind. This however gave me opportunities to learn new things. We first started class lectures by reading papers on certain signaling pathways and discussing anatomy of the brain. I started to become interested when I realized how real these pathways were. The interest in the course only became larger when we started to discuss diseases that could possibly be associated with the brain.

Throughout my time as a Neurochemistry student, I started to gradually learn more each time. I looked forward to class and hearing what others had to bring to the table. There were different perspectives and opinions all over the room, but the class allowed us to share our differences in a nonjudgmental way. One cool part about all the information the class provided was that I took that knowledge with me and discussed it further with my roommates. Unlike many other classes, neurochemistry built a platform that could take with me and easily show others what I learned.

Following Concordia’s goals, I was also able to learn more about different cultures. For example, we might have wondered why a certain country has more cases of autism than another country. I have always thought of neuro disorders as a worldwide diagnosis, but the class allowed us to see the cultural differences. Learning these culture differences was new to me and more information I could further share with others. Sharing with others, as you might tell, was a common theme in the class. Dr. Mach did a great job of creating an environment where everyone was engaged. Being able to share our information to others was awesome. This also is what encourages to further our engagement and continue to share with the world.

The skills that were learned throughout the course were all new to me. Obviously, I knew some of the chemistry, but I had never applied it like this course taught me to do. All my learning was new information which was strange to me. I say strange as in a good way. All my life, I have been taking courses that I at least have some knowledge on. For example, in Calculus 2, everyone is around the same in terms of known information. The first couple of chapters are parts of Calculus 1 that you had already learned. In Neurochemistry, it was always something new. This new information was then able to be shared on our class blog. The blog allowed us to share what we learned from each of our papers. Not only was this fun to do, but it allowed me to transfer those skills into the real world. As a potential future pharmacist, I will have to provide information that I have studied to customers. This in a way relates to the blogs. I studied and received information and then shared the blogs for the whole world to see.

I must thank Concordia for providing a liberal arts education because if it weren’t for the initial PEAK requirements, I would have never thought about taking this class. This is something that one really does not understand until they go through the liberal arts education. Freshman year we see a lot of students upset about all the extra “dumb” courses they have to take. I will not lie; I was one of those students. If senior Toby Sayles could say anything to freshman Toby, I would call him the dumb one. The liberal arts curriculum has allowed me to branch off into a variety of different courses. All of the courses that were considered “extra” were my most memorable courses. The skills and information gained from the two PEAK courses I took will surpass any of the skills I take from other courses. I feel all students should experience a liberal arts education in the pure fact that it might make the world a better place.

Lastly, if I were to put a skill on my resume that has upgraded the most from Neurochemistry it would be my listening skills. By active listening, I was able to gain more information than ever have before. Although it was not always easy to listen to different opinions, I learned that by doing so I could better understand my own. Neurochemistry has allowed me an opportunity to better myself as an individual and a student and I will forever be grateful for that.

All college seniors naturally find themselves at a point of reflection. During this time, seniors entering the work force, graduate school, medical school, ext. find themselves contemplating not only what’s next, but also the previous 3 years. Personally, I’ve had a significant amount of time this semester to look back at my time at Concordia and contemplate what I’m truly going to take away as a neuro and psych major. Neurochemistry gave me the opportunity to do this in a way I never thought possible.

The Landscape of Neuroscience

Neuroscience is a naturally interdisciplinary fields where chemistry, biology, and psychology all come together to tell the story of the brain. As a psychology major, I naturally find myself leaning towards psychology side of neuroscience, while the chemistry aspect of this story is something that made me nervous. I walked into the first day of Neurochemistry where many others had 3 full years of chemistry under their belts, and there was me armed only with my survey of organic and biochemistry class from sophomore year. While I was nervous, I quickly realized this is a class where my skillset would not hurt me, but help me and the others around me. The neurochemistry class is a team, with each member tackling questions and wrestling with ideas through their own expertise. I often found myself investigating the cognitive and psychological implications of various diseases, while I was very appreciative of those who studied the individual receptors and kinases of signaling cascades that I would have been scratching my head if I had to explain. In this facet, I see us going on to tackle the worlds problems in much a similar way. In any team, you rely on each other’s strength and weaknesses to come together to accomplish a goal, and it was fun to see this shine through in an academic environment. Through this environment, we naturally followed the goals for liberal learning that this college values greatly.

We fostered a love for learning as each week we had the opportunity to investigate what made our own wheels turn, and more importantly explain that in a way that makes sense to someone who may not know as much about that question.

We developed critical foundational skills allowing us to communicate and work together to share our ideas in one on one, and group settings where our intellect could shine. We listened and grew with each-other through discussions that merged science with everyday life.

Throughout the class, we saw how science can bring complex issues together. From the spiritual and implications of schizophrenic hallucinations, to the complex societal issues surrounding obesity, as both scientists and citizens we examined hundreds of interdisciplinary connections reaching much further than an 8-page review article.

One of the beautiful things about neurochemistry is the fact that it can be applied to each of our lives. Everyone has felt stressed, maybe had a sugar craving that felt like a withdrawal, or listened to their favorite song and felt a surge of reward. Understanding the neurochemical implications of these examples contributes to a deeper sense of self that brings science together with our conscious perception of the world.

Artstract by B. Swanson

BREW

And of course, the most pressing question, how did we BREW? The reality is, we forget most of what we learn in our classes. We must ask ourselves, what can I takeaway from Neurochem and why does it matter? I think each of us should reflect and answer these questions for ourselves because it varies person to person. For me, I come from a strong psychology background, but the world of psychology is changing. With each fMRI and EEG study psychological concepts that were once explained by a superego can now be better explained though the function of the pre-frontal cortex and a signaling cascade. There are hundreds of examples where previous theories are now supported directly or indirectly by neural evidence. Indeed, in my view the world of psych and neuro are on a collision course and it would be wise to understand both worlds to become a modern psychologist. Looking back at my Concordia education, this is the edge I try to incorporate into each graduate school application. What I loved about this neurochemistry class is I saw so many different skillsets from my classmates come together. I saw neuro merge with psych, bio, and of course, chemistry. As each of us set out to contribute to the world, we do so armed with our own unique knowledge and experiences. In this class, we added diversity to our own worldviews over the course of the semester by taking in each other’s unique expertise and points of view. I am excited to see how this impacts the future doctors, professors, researchers, ext. in that room as we all integrate our liberal arts education with the hard sciences. While we all see the world through our own experiences, over the course of this semester, we merged our knowledge and experiences giving each of us a stronger and more diverse worldview. This will ultimately contribute to us tackling the worlds problems much like we tackled each paper that came our way; through a diverse set of perspectives that, when merged, created an enviornment of learning that would not have been possible without such variety. Thank you to you all for a fantastic semester!

There is nothing more unifying, but also diversifying than music. This juxtaposition is part of what makes music a critical interest to all, including researchers. Music is unifying in the way that everyone share some kind of experience with it; nearly every human can identify a memory that is triggered by a certain song. Perhaps a smell triggers a memory of a song, or a certain place brings back the memory of the first time you heard a tune. While we all share some aspect of a musical experience, these experiences vary greatly. For some, it is creating music themselves that encompasses their musical experience. For others, myself included, simply listening to music is the most prominent experience, as I have absolutely no ability to create it myself. Regardless of musical experience, perhaps where music is most unifying is within our brains, where music is processed similarly for most members of the population.

Music in the brain

Music elicits a variety of consequences in the brain; however none may be more prevalent than the rewarding, “feel good” effect. Where does this come from? Music, like many things can trigger the brain’s reward pathway which leads to a dopamine dump that keeps you opening your Spotify to listen to the next song. Your brain even begins to anticipate this reward, however the brains reaction to this anticipatory event remains unclear. Furthermore, music has been shown to alleviate stress in the brain by activating the Hypothalamic Pituitary Axis which has a calming effect to the individual by modulating other areas of the brain associated with higher stress and arousal. In light of these findings, the potential for music therapy as a future, empirically proven technique becomes a scientific possibility. In a world where pharmacological options for disorders involving stress are the most common treatment, music therapy opens the opportunity for a complimentary option with relatively no side effects.

Your Favorite Song

While the broad stroking effects of music are fascinating, what happens when your experiencing music much more personally, such as your favorite song? If you’re like me, when I hear my favorite song it’s accompanied by memories, a distinct happiness with the rhythm and beat, as well as a myriad of memories that flood my consciousness and allow me to immerse myself in the song. As it turns out, there is neural evidence to support this experience. When you’re listening to your favorite song, your pre-frontal cortex (sense of self), hippocampus (memory), and lateral parietal cortex (association area) all become active and link together. The research suggests the all-encompassing feeling of your favorite song is indeed represented in this circuit. While listening to music you don’t prefer, only the association area of the brain lights up, which is merely responsible for your perception of the rhythm and sound. This fascinating phenomenon provides evidence that your personal perception of music, is correlated with your brain firing together and providing an immersive experience that floods the reward center of the listener.

Conclusion

Whether you’re a musician, or just a music lover, music is often an integral part of our lives. As it turns out, it’s also a uniquely processed in our brain that can even be leveraged for therapeutic benefits. So next time you hear your favorite song, shut your eyes, relax, and let your brain take over.

Good things in life often come with risks. Sports are no exception; lots of physical, social and psychological benefits can be gained from engaging in sports, but many of them come with a risk of injury to the brain. A person can get a concussion through a variety different avenues, and sports are one of the most common-  other ways include falling, vehicle accidents and military combat, or anything else that causes physical trauma to the head. Given the serious impact that concussions can have on our brain’s functioning, any steps to minimize this risk should arguably be taken. This may not only include further research and improved screening, but dietary supplements as well. 

Medically speaking, concussions are called Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and are most directly caused by biomechanical force (considered the first injury phase) that disrupts the brain’s functioning (the second injury phase). The second injury phase involves the consequences of the first injury phase, and consists of many detrimental effects. For example, TBI has the ability to cause increased axon permeability and damaged neurofilaments in the brain, both of which may lead to axon dysfunction or disconnection. Much of this dysfunction builds upon itself as a cascade of events; initial ionic flux and glutamate release caused by the biomechanical force can result in increased energy demands and a period of metabolic crisis, leading to even more dysregulation. Inflammatory changes can also be triggered by TBI, possibly resulting in cellular injury and immunoexcitotoxicity. 

The Western medical system typically revolves around a “one problem, one solution” framework, but given how many ways our brain can be affected on a cellular level by TBI, a treatment that targets multiple aspects may be necessary. This is where dietary supplements come in. Omega-3 fatty acids (also called n-3FAs) may be able to fulfill a role like this, since they have the ability to affect all major mechanisms of TBI second injury phase through neuroregeneration, neuroprotection, and neuroinflammation. 

There are three types of omega-3 fatty acids used by the human body: ALA, EPA, and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), but the majority of omega-3 fatty acids in the brain are DHA, functioning as a main ‘ingredient’ in central nervous system membranes. Increasing the amount of DHA present in membranes can promote neurite growth, branching, and synaptogenesis which support regeneration. In addition, protective molecules such as neuroprotectin D1 are derived from DHA in response to cellular stress. Since DHA is anti-inflammatory by nature, and anti-inflammatory resolvins are also derived from DHA, it may help to reduce neuroinflammation caused by TBI as well.

Surprisingly, there is currently a complete lack of randomized clinical trials (RCTs) for use of omega-3 fatty acid supplements as a treatment for TBI. Evidence is largely anecdotal so far, but a few connected case studies suggest strong treatment potential. In 2010, a teenager got into a car accident and suffered severe TBI with diffuse axonal injury that the head neurosurgeon thought would be lethal. By day 10, he was in a permanent vegetative state. Based on a previous treatment success for a man who had survived a mining explosion, the teenager was given 20g of n-3FA daily. He was weaned off the ventilator by day 21, and went home 4 months later. Then, a mother with an 8-year old daughter who had been in a comatose condition for 82 days from brain injury saw this story on TV- she asked her doctors to try the same treatment, and her daughter was discharged one month later.

Of course, a benefit vs. risk analysis should also be considered regarding the use of fatty acid supplements for treatment of TBI. Side effects, if present, are generally mild and short term, with the only other risk cited by the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health being a possible association with prostate cancer (studies have had conflicting findings). The average Western diet is highly pro-inflammatory, and it is likely that many of us have a deficiency of omega- 3 fatty acids that could increase susceptibility for TBI. For this reason, supplementation may not be a bad idea for prevention as well as treatment, or even to support our brain’s functioning in general.

While there are no published RCTs that examine treatment potential of omega-3 fatty acids to date, three (1, 2, 3) new trials have been in progress since 2019! This should help clarify both the safety and efficacy of these supplements, possibly paving the way for their incorporation into treatment plans and offering added protection from damage to our brains. This, in turn, this could help reduce the risk of sports that many people love.