{"id":114276,"date":"2020-10-12T17:26:03","date_gmt":"2020-10-13T00:26:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2020\/10\/scientists-find-neurochemicals-have-unexpectedly-profound-roles-in-the-human-brain"},"modified":"2020-10-12T17:26:03","modified_gmt":"2020-10-13T00:26:03","slug":"scientists-find-neurochemicals-have-unexpectedly-profound-roles-in-the-human-brain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2020\/10\/scientists-find-neurochemicals-have-unexpectedly-profound-roles-in-the-human-brain","title":{"rendered":"Scientists find neurochemicals have unexpectedly profound roles in the human brain"},"content":{"rendered":"

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In first-of-their-kind observations in the human brain, an international team of researchers has revealed two well-known neurochemicals\u2013dopamine and serotonin\u2013are at work at sub-second speeds to shape how people perceive the world and take action based on their perception.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, the neurochemicals appear to integrate people\u2019s perceptions of the world with their actions, indicating dopamine and serotonin have far more expansive roles in the human nervous system than previously known.<\/p>\n

Known as neuromodulators, dopamine and serotonin have traditionally been linked to reward processing\u2013how good or how bad people perceive an outcome to be after taking an action.<\/p>\n

The study online today in the journal *Neuron* opens the door to a deeper understanding of an expanded role for these systems and their roles in human health.<\/p>\n

\u201cAn enormous number of people throughout the world are taking pharmaceutical compounds to perturb the dopamine and serotonin transmitter systems to change their behavior and mental health,\u201d said P. Read Montague, senior author of the study and a professor and director of the Center for Human Neuroscience Research and the Human Neuroimaging Laboratory at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at Virginia Tech Carilion. \u201cFor the first time, moment-to-moment activity in these systems has been measured and determined to be involved in perception and cognitive capacities. These neurotransmitters are simultaneously acting and integrating activity across vastly different time and space scales than anyone expected.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cThese neuromodulators play a much broader role in supporting human behavior and thought, and in particular they are involved in how we process the outside world,\u201d Bang said. \u201cFor example, if you move through a room and the lights are off, you move differently because you\u2019re uncertain about where objects are. Our work suggests these neuromodulators\u2013serotonin in particular\u2013 are playing a role in signaling how uncertain we are about the outside environment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading \u201cScientists find neurochemicals have unexpectedly profound roles in the human brain\u201d | ><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In first-of-their-kind observations in the human brain, an international team of researchers has revealed two well-known neurochemicals\u2013dopamine and serotonin\u2013are at work at sub-second speeds to shape how people perceive the world and take action based on their perception. Furthermore, the neurochemicals appear to integrate people\u2019s perceptions of the world with their actions, indicating dopamine and [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":501,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,19,1495,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-114276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-chemistry","category-health","category-neuroscience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/501"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114276"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114276\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}