Researchers have uncovered a new way to improve memory function by sending electromagnetic pulses to specific sections of the human brain.
TMS, or Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, is a widely used therapy for patients with brain disorders and it involves stimulating different areas of the brain by inserting coiled magnets on the patient’s scalp. Unsure about how and why this procedure works, researchers continue to study all positive feedback and outcomes of this procedure and hope it will continue to assist patients with memory loss issues and disorders. Researchers are hopeful this procedure will even one day be able to counter-act diseases involving memory loss.
Joel Voss, a neuroscientist at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine, along with his colleagues employed 16 healthy adults for a memory experiment. First, Voss and his colleagues studied and drew maps of the adult’s brains. The subjects were then all given a simply memory test, and during so, the researchers recorded all brain stimulation and connections. Five days after the initial experiment, the subjects repeated the same memory test and the team noted that the individual’s new scores had improved by 20-25 percent.
Whether this new procedure will one day assist patients with Alzheimer’s disease or simply help individuals remember where they put their car keys, researchers remain optimistic about the results of TMS experimentation.
