© Pint of Science, 2024. All rights reserved.
Your brain does many jobs. It controls your heart and lungs. It makes your body move. It is your thoughts, feelings and memories. But what happens when it goes wrong? Tonight we hear from two people who try to fix them when they do. The Beautiful Mind events will be taking place in the upstairs function room at the Percy Arms, Percy Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RW. Convenient for Haymarket and Eldon square public transport. Please note this venue has a strict no under 18’s policy. The function room is accessed by stairs and there is no lift.
Using our thinking caps to battle dementia: how is human brain tissue used in dementia research?
Lauren Walker
(Research Associate, Newcastle University)
Dementia affects 850,000 people in the UK with this number set to increase. There are numerous ways in which scientists study dementia, however, one of the best ways to research diseases that cause dementia is to look at the brains of people who had dementia during life. The Newcastle Brain Tissue Resource houses brain tissue donated by members of the public after death, who had dementia and also those without dementia, and this talk will describe how researchers use this brain tissue in the battle against dementia.
The brain surgeon will see you now
Patrick Mitchell
(Consultant Neurosurgeon; Newcastle Upon Tyne Hospitals (NUTH) NHS Foundation Trust)
Since the stone age, people have tried to cure headaches with ‘Trephining’ - drilling a hole in your skull to let the evil spirits out. Neurosurgery has come a long way since then but how far? Neurosurgery is a small specialty operating on the margins of evidence-based practice. Many of the operations we do we have solid objective evidence of their value but many others, probably most, have stubbornly resisted our attempts to prove their worth with scientific methods. Join us for a glimpse into the fascinating world of surgery on the brain and spine with someone who does it for a living.
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