Reconditioning the Brain

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  This is an article I found very interesting from science daily. Students at the University of Cambridge found a way with artificial intelligence and brain scanning to actually unconciously remove a specific fear from the brain. In short the developers used a new technique called 'Decoded Neurofeedback'. This allowed them to identify a brain pattern that was similar to a specific fear memory. When the developers found that wavelength of activity they gave the participants a reward telling them it was based off brain activity. Though the participants did not know why, but they were subconciously overwriting the fear pattern with reward. A prime example of conditioning.
  The results were positive. There were know signs of palm sweat or other fear showing signs in the amygdala. To broaden this for patients they need to be able to find more codes for neurofeedback to identify more pathological fears. I found it interesting because it kind of related to the memory chapter of class. The brain stores most memory in the hippocampus, but when moved to cortical areas of the brain the fear center is mainly the amygdala. I really liked this article because this is a great discovery. The more research and funding put into this could really help identify more PTSD fears that could potentially be reconditioned. The sky seems to be the limit as of now.



https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/11/161121175251.htm

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