Following on our post on brain plasticity there is new evidence that we continue to create neurons in our brains throughout our lives, and in particular in the Hippocampus, where our memories are stored.
A good summary is in this post ‘How Our Behaviors and Activities Control the Growth of New Cells‘ by Valeria Maltoni.
We do produce some new neurons. Not so many, but ‘Jonas Frisén from the Karolinska Institutet has estimated that we produce 700 new neurons per day in the hippocampus. You might think this is not much, compared to the billions of neurons we have. But by the time we turn 50, we will have all exchanged the neurons we were born with in that structure with adult-born neurons‘.
The next question is then, how we could or should influence this creation of new neurons. The post referred to supposes it is better to foster the creation of more, but I guess that is still part of research.
In any case, this research is another blow to the Industrial Age theory or all theories around the fact that we can’t change significantly behaviors and memories.
