Science!
Profound changes that sweep across the human brain during pregnancy have been captured for the first time, after researchers performed precision scans on a woman carrying her child.
MRI scans taken every few weeks from before conception until two years after childbirth revealed widespread reorganisation in the mother’s brain, with some changes short-lived and others lasting years.
The work, described as “truly heroic” by one independent expert, paves the way for a far deeper understanding of the mother’s brain in pregnancy. Further scans are now being gathered from other pregnant women to learn about the risks of
postnatal depression, the link between
pre-eclampsia and dementia, and why pregnancy can
reduce migraines and
symptoms of multiple sclerosis.
Scientists took 26 brain scans of a healthy 38-year-old woman who conceived via IVF, and concurrent blood samples to monitor the dramatic surges in hormones during pregnancy. The data revealed how the brain changed, week by week.
Most apparent was a steady decrease in grey matter, the wrinkly outer surface of the brain, throughout pregnancy and a temporary peak in neural connectivity at the end of the second trimester.
“The maternal brain undergoes this choreographed change across gestation and we’re finally able to observe the process in real time,” said Prof Emily Jacobs, a researcher on the study at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Scientists have previously taken snapshots of women’s brains at various points in pregnancy, but the latest work shows how these can miss temporary changes that revert to normal by the time the woman gives birth.
Writing in
Nature Neuroscience, the lead author, Laura Pritschet, and her colleagues describe how soaring hormones, such as oestrogen and progesterone, drive significant physiological changes in pregnancy, affecting blood plasma, metabolism, oxygen consumption and immunity. The same hormones resculpt the brain.…….
https://www.theguardian.com/science...-of-brain-in-pregnancy?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other