The brain in winter

The human brain operates in a protected environment of constant temperature and uninterrupted resources of oxygen and nutrients. However, many other vertebrates show amazing plasticity of their brain function. Their brains function with greater flexibility and provide important lessons for us about “How Brains Work” under stressful environmental conditions. My lab studies vertebrate species that freeze solid in winter (including their brains), changing brain biochemistry and gene regulation to endure freeze/thaw with no damage. The brains other vertebrates can survive with no oxygen; we would be dead but for them it’s no problem, no damage. Many non-human mammals hibernate in winter – turning down their brain metabolism to near zero using epigenetic controls to shut down gene expression and posttranslational controls to suppress protein/enzyme function, all reversible with no damage. Some hibernators can chill their bodies to near 0°C, suppressing brain function for weeks/months. Others hibernate at high body temperature with complex controls to coordinate the suppression of their metabolism. Studies of all these animals teach us new paradigms of metabolic control and demonstrate the enormous plasticity of animal metabolism. Future of Brain Health:  can we find ways to utilize lessons from Nature to unlock more flexibility of brain function than we have found to date and apply these lessons to protecting the human brain from disease and damage