Our brains are self-cleaning, however that system has never been properly understood. It’s a “sewage system” that gets rid of waste proteins and had been observed in mice, but only theorized in humans. That is until now.
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00:00Our brains are self-cleaning, however that system has never been properly understood.
00:08Its sewage system exists deep within the folds and wrinkles and brings cerebrospinal fluid
00:13to the surface to bathe both the outside and interior of the brain, bringing with it nutrients
00:18the central nervous system needs and taking away any accumulated waste that is formed.
00:22This system has been observed in mice before, but only theorized in humans, that is, until
00:27now.
00:28Scientists have named the waste removal method the glymphatic system, and for the first time
00:32they have mapped exactly how it works in human brains.
00:35They were even able to image the process in humans by adding a dark contrast tracer to
00:39the cerebrospinal fluid, or CSF, of five adults undergoing brain surgery.
00:44They then scanned the patients with MRI and tracked the CSF as it moved through the brain,
00:48finding that it wouldn't be directly absorbed by the brain, rather it would follow the blood
00:51vessels of the brain deeper into the tissue.
00:54In fact, they found there was a perivascular channel around those blood vessels, one that
00:58the CSF could permeate and travel through to reach deeper neurological tissue.