Dolphins can help discover the
secret of repairing the human brain, according to Turin
university researchers.
Neurogenesis, or the capacity of producing neurons, is linked
to smell, the Cavalieri Ottolenghi Neuroscience Institute team
said in a study published in the Brain Structure & Function
journal.
Dolphins lost their sense of smell 40 million years ago but
thanks to their land-based ancestor they have a vestigial sense
remaining.
In man, too, for whom smell has become less important for
survival, this region is less active.
But just as smell may be reinforced, the production of nerve
cells may be boosted too, the team said.
"These results," says researcher Luca Bonfanti, "do not
exclude that research may one day be able to modulate the
residues of neurogenetic activity remaining in man for a
therapeutic purpose".
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