A new study at the University of
Iowa Carver College of Medicine finds that stimulating the cerebellum in rats
with schizophrenia-like thinking problems normalizes brain activity in the
frontal cortex and corrects the rats’ ability to estimate the passage of time –
a cognitive deficit that is characteristic in people with schizophrenia.
Cerebellar interactions with the
frontal cortex in cognitive processes has never been shown before in animal
models. In addition to showing that the signal travels from the cerebellum to
the frontal cortex, the study also showed that normal timing behavior was
rescued when the signal was restored.
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