Scientists are looking at a new treatment option for addiction and depression in the form of ultrasound waves. Jan Kubanek, an Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Utah, and his teammates used ultrasound waves to control macaque monkeys' brains in a recent study.
In their experiment, the US researchers directed ultrasound waves at points in the brain's frontal cortex, influencing the monkey's decision to select one of two targets in a computerized selection test.
According to scientists, if their approach is applied to humans, it could provide a pain-free ultrasound brain stimulation aimed to treat disorders that have something to do with decision-making. Some of these illnesses include binge eating and addiction. They believe that this non-invasive therapy could possibly replace drugs or even surgery.
Moreover, the authors of the study believe that ultrasound waves could also treat mental disorders like anxiety and depression or neurological disabilities such as epilepsy or chronic pain.
Kubanek said that brain disorders should be treated in a personalized and focused approach instead of first offering patients with drugs. He adds that a non-invasive, precise, and customized tool to address the source of each patient's problem would be more ideal. The team's efforts have now made this a possibility, he said.
According to Kubanek, their paper shows that ultrasound can produce effects so strong that it could influence behavior. He adds that his team built a prototype device to carry out the treatments in human patients.
In three years, the team plans to start clinical trials in patients with major depression. The researchers say that their study also includes recommendations for future operations of 'ultrasonic neuromodulation' in both humans and animals.
The findings of their study have been published in the journal Science Advances.
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How does Ultrasound Therapy Work?
Many types of therapeutic ultrasound use different intensities and frequencies of sound. However, all models share the basic principle of "stimulating" or even arousing tissue with sound waves above the range of human hearing.
In the study, ultrasonic waves aimed for precision therapy deal with pulses of sound at a high, inaudible frequency. These pulses are aimed into the brain using an ultrasonic transducer, just like the wands used for ultrasound scans.
According to the researchers, the sound pulses target neural circuits in the brain, then activate neurons and influence the behavior that those neurons command. They say that the effects of ultrasound on behavior in larger animals and humans have also not yet been well studied as opposed to rodents.
How do Addiction and Depression Affect Decision-making?
In a study published in 2010, researchers found that both pessimism and negative emotionality were linked with depression symptoms. Moreover, the researchers discovered that individuals with a higher level of depression symptoms perceived fewer resources as being available to them.
Similarly, the tendency of depressed persons to be unwilling to take active decision-making approaches could also be predicted given their lack of energy and reduced motivation, as observed in most depressed individuals, the authors explained.
Concerning addiction, a study from 2006 uncovered that drugs possess properties of triggering bottom-up, involuntary signals through the amygdala. Furthermore, these properties modulate and bias top-down goal-driven attentional resources needed for the normal operation of a person's reflective system.
The researchers say that this is critical for exerting control, enabling an individual to resist the temptation to seek the drug. Moreover, they say that there is evidence to propose that somatic-markers may exert their biasing influence on decisions through the release of specific neurotransmitters, according to the authors.
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