The Escaped Sapiens Podcast Deanna Barch: How do our brains work? | Escaped Sapiens Podcast #16
Jul 15, 2021
Deanna Barch, a Washington University professor involved in the Human Connectome Project, studies brain connectivity, development, and stress effects. She walks through brain mapping scales, imaging limits, stimulation methods, and how plasticity, early adversity, and caregiving shape wiring. The conversation also covers computational bridging of animal and human data and implications for treatment and policy.
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Missing Links Between Brain Scales
- Brain maps exist at multiple scales from molecules to whole regions, but we lack connecting maps that show how levels scale up and down.
- Deanna Barch says the next challenge is linking cellular, local-circuit, and macro-scale network maps to explain thought and behavior.
Human Imaging Is Limited To Millimeter Scale
- Human neuroimaging is mainly millimeter-scale using MRI, which captures regions containing thousands of cells rather than single neurons.
- Deanna Barch notes animal methods like optogenetics give cellular precision but are too invasive for safe human use.
Probe Brain Regions With Safe Stimulation
- Use noninvasive stimulation like TMS or tDCS to probe or transiently reduce region activity in humans when invasive inactivation isn't possible.
- Deanna Barch cautions these scalp-applied methods lack high focality but are the safest options presently.