It sounds like the work of an evil genius, but scientists have been blasting the brains of mice with laser beams to see how it changes their behaviour.
Researchers from Yale focused a laser on a region of the brain – the amygdala – which turned on a predatory pathway.
The mice then chased and attacked anything in their cages, whether they were faced with real or artificial prey.
Circuit dissection of how central amygdala controls aggression https://t.co/0BS4y39gkr pic.twitter.com/Dka5vkYW9C
— Adam J Calhoun (@neuroecology) January 12, 2017
The lasered mice became incredibly aggressive hunters of both crickets and bottle caps, and grabbed and bit their “prey” regardless of whether or not it was moving.The effects weren’t permanent, stopping as soon as the lasers did – and the mice didn’t attempt to attack other mice, implying that this is a prey-hunting brain mechanism.Lead author Dr Ivan de Araujo told the Financial Times: “We now have a grip on their anatomical identities, so we hope we can manipulate them even more precisely in the future.”
Identifying brain pathways from the central amygdala responsible for predatory hunting https://t.co/luhbI5I8Ek Cool findings! @CellCellPress pic.twitter.com/oxSVYH8DVs
— Dheeraj Roy (@dheerajroy7) January 12, 2017
Raising an army of hyper-aggressive mice sounds apocalyptic, but humans share similar brain-jaw pathways with mice.
This research could pave the way to real-world treatments for people with neurological diseases involving the jaw and the neck, which are an important part of the hunting mechanism seen in these mice.
The paper was published in the journal Cell, and you can read it here.
