Hacker News Comments on "The Other Brain: The Scientific and Medical Breakthroughs That Will Heal Our Brains and Revolutionize Our Health" Amazon Repository

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Hacker News Comments on
The Other Brain: The Scientific and Medical Breakthroughs That Will Heal Our Brains and Revolutionize Our Health

R. Douglas Fields Ph.D. · 2 HN comments

HN Books has aggregated all Hacker News stories and comments that mention "The Other Brain: The Scientific and Medical Breakthroughs That Will Heal Our Brains and Revolutionize Our Health" by R. Douglas Fields Ph.D..

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Amazon Summary

Despite everything that has been written about the brain, a potentially critical part of this vital organ has been overlooked—until now. The Other Brain examines the growing importance of glia, which make up approximately 85 percent of the cells in the brain, and the role they play in how the brain functions, malfunctions, and heals itself. Long neglected as little more than cerebral packing material, glia (meaning “glue”) are now known to regulate the flow of information between neurons and to repair the brain and spinal cord after injury and stroke. But scientists are also discovering that diseased and damaged glia play a significant role in psychiatric illnesses such as schizophrenia and depression, and in neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. Diseased glia cause brain cancer and multiple sclerosis and are linked to infectious diseases such as HIV and prion disease (mad cow disease, for example) and to chronic pain. The more we learn about these cells that make up the “other” brain, the more important they seem to be. Written by a neuroscientist who is a leader in glial research, The Other Brain gives readers a much more complete understanding of how the brain works and an intriguing look at potentially revolutionary developments in brain science and medicine.

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Hacker News Stories and Comments

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Apr 15, 2016 · markdog12 on Know Your Neurons (2012)

If you're interested in glial cells, this was an excellent book - http://www.amazon.com/The-Other-Brain-Breakthroughs-Revoluti...

⬐ idrios
Very cool! Thanks, I just ordered it

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Nov 20, 2014 · npalli on Many Older Brains Have Plasticity, but in a Different Place

It is fascinating to note that the changes occurred in the white matter portion of the brain. The general thought (challenged recently) is that only the gray/grey matter neurons 'mattered'. White matter was just conduction between the grey matter neurons (which had all the intelligence). The final quantity of these grey neurons was fixed shortly after birth and people kept losing them as they aged.
If it turns out the body can recruit white matter in learning then suddenly we have 10-50 times more cells (white matter/grey matter ratio) that can participate in intelligence. I suspect the way intelligence is organized would also differ between the white and grey regions. Not to mention how they interact with each other!. It calls into question a lot of the assumptions computational scientists make in coming up with the complexity of a simulated brain. We might be at the start of understanding how truly complex the brain is.
A good overview of this understudied portion of the brain is the the book "the other brain" by douglas fields.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Other-Brain-Breakthroughs-Revoluti...

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Hacker News Comments on The Other Brain: The Scientific and Medical Breakthroughs That Will Heal Our Brains and Revolutionize Our Health

Hacker News Stories and Comments

Hacker News Comments on
The Other Brain: The Scientific and Medical Breakthroughs That Will Heal Our Brains and Revolutionize Our Health