After reaching the employees of the Salk Institute's genetic laboratory, who managed to grow human brain cells, the scientific community again raised the question, is this research really necessary, because a person can live normally with practically no brain, and in the literal sense.
In this case, we are talking about the case of an ordinary French civil servant Mathieu R., which has not been fully solved by modern medicine. More precisely, a Frenchman was considered an ordinary person until 2007, when it was completely accidental that it turned out that he literally lived almost his entire life without a brain, or rather, with such a tiny brain that one can safely say about its absence.
It turned out when Mathieu came to one of the French hospitals complaining of pain in his legs, which had bothered him for the past few weeks. The examination and standard tests did not help the doctors to diagnose their patient and then they ordered a full examination. When the turn came to examine the man's head, the French doctors wondered if it was time for them to turn to their colleagues - ophthalmologists - for help.
The thing is that during the scan it turned out that the Frenchman had such a small brain that at first the specialists did not even notice him in the pictures.
After the tests, it turned out that all the cerebrospinal fluid, which in an ordinary person should circulate through the brain and be excreted into the circulatory system, in Mathieu filled almost the entire cranium, leaving only a small part of the gray matter.
Scientists began to understand how such a phenomenon could arise and found out that as a child, Mathieu was undergoing treatment for hydrocephalus, that is, from the accumulation of excess fluid in the brain. Then, in order to remove excess fluid, the doctors performed bypass surgery on their little patient, and later the bypass was removed, but, as it turned out, the problem did not disappear.
For decades, excess fluid accumulated in the Frenchman's skull, displacing the brain, but made itself felt, manifested by pain in the legs, it was only in 2007, when the patient was already 44 years old. For the past eight years, scientists have studied this phenomenon. Why the Frenchman's brain is so tiny, they explained the consequences of hydrocephalus, but how he lived with him all these years, for specialists still remains a mystery.
And Mathieu lived all these years quite normally. His mental and neurological development, as well as his medical history, were normal. He has been married for many years and has two children to whom his father's disease was not inherited by heredity - their brain size is absolutely normal.
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If it were not for pain in the legs, the scientific community might never have learned about the unique case when in the human head most of the "living space" is occupied by cerebrospinal fluid, not the brain. The only thing wrong with Mathieu is his IQ level. He is slightly below the norm, which, however, did not prevent him from getting a job in the civil service and working for the good of his country for many years.
It is the case with Mathieu that makes scientists think about the question of how much a person needs a brain. In a recent study, researchers at the Salk Institute's genetic laboratory have grown human brain cells using skin samples from adults.
"This technique has allowed aging-related traits to be preserved in brain cells so that we can study the effects of age on the brain," said senior study author Professor Rusty Gage.
The new technology will be used in research on methods of treating diseases such as Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and other diseases associated with age-related changes in the brain.
