Review of neuronal growth and control highlights interdisciplinary future

There are approximately 86 billion neurons in an adult brain, but scientists don’t fully understand how they work or are connected in neural networks, despite a century of study. In the past decade, advances in nanotechnology and material sciences as well as neurobiology are making in-vitro neural networks engineering increasingly interdisciplinary.

Studies of neuronal growth have the potential to provide better understanding of brain-related diseases and allow for breakthroughs in computing devices and brain-machine interfaces. Raj et al. presents a review of the advances and mechanisms of neuronal growth and control. While previous reviews focused on singular aspect of either neuronal growth or control, this review covers both in a manner aimed to appeal to researchers from a wide range of backgrounds.

“This is one of the first reviews that covers both biochemical and biophysical mechanisms of neuronal growth and delves deep into how these mechanisms are being used to control and modulate neuronal growth,” said author Vidur Raj. “We expect it will be suitable for a large audience, even those not from a neuroscience background.”

The review covers an overview of the fundamental aspects of neuronal growth and how complimentary biophysical and biochemical processes can be used to control in-vitro neuronal growth, allowing for advancements in-vitro engineering of neuronal networks for biomedical applications. The review summarizes problems that remain to be tackled, in hopes it will help researchers start exploring the ongoing questions in the field.

“There is so much to come,” Raj said. “The future holds great potential for brain-machine interfaces, personalized medicine, and cures for a plethora of neurological diseases.”

Source: “Understanding, engineering and modulating the growth of neural networks: An interdisciplinary approach,” by Vidur Raj, Chennupati Jagadish, and Vini Gautam, Biophysics Reviews (2021). The article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0043014 .