The Chemistry and Communication Within the Brain

 Lacey Fritzler

Curated Paper 2

October 30, 2020

The Chemistry and Communication Within the Brain

Michio Kaku, a famous American physicist, said this about the brain, “The human brain has 100 billion neurons, each neuron connected to 10 thousand other neurons. Sitting on your shoulders is the most complicated object in the known universe” The brain is an extremely fascinating and complex organ. It is probably the organ that is studied the most, and yet it is the least understood because the more we research and discover, the more we realize we still do not have a clear understanding of how it works. One thing that is clear, however, is that the brain is a well tuned system that controls everything in the body on a second-by-second basis to keep a person functioning properly. Diseases, disorders, damages, and drugs can all cause it to have complications. It is important to first understand the parts of the brain and the functions they have. 

The brain has many parts and functions. It has two sides and is covered in gyri and sulci, which are the bumps and grooves respectively. These play an important role in increasing surface area to make more neurological connections and allowing more brain matter to fit in the cranium. The brain is also made up of four lobes which each control different aspects of our function including, but not limited to, problem solving, planning, reasoning, detecting sensory information, and storing memories. The cerebellum lies below the brain and is there for balance and coordination (Lobes of the brain, 2018). That is just the superficial part of the brain called the cerebral cortex. Underneath is an even more complex system with more parts to control the brain. Inside the brain there are three parts, the forebrain, midbrain, and hindbrain which regulate motor function, senses, hormones, sleep, homeostasis, temperature, blood pressure, and appetite. This very rudimentary explanation alone shows how complicated the brain is. (The forebrain, midbrain, hindbrain, 2018) Each part has smaller parts that have important functions as well. If anything were to go wrong, the whole body could be affected.

The brain can have physical and mental problems which may cause it to react in complicated ways. Concussions, a topic that was very relevant just a few years ago, are an example of physical damage that can occur in the brain. A concussion occurs when the brain, which is made of soft tissues, gets slammed against the side of the skull (Pfaller, 2016). This can cause headaches, vomiting, vision impairment, or more severely, memory loss. Concussions are traumatic brain injuries and are now treated with more gravity because they may result in other complications such as Second Impact Syndrome and Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (Bey, 2009). The brain can damage itself such is the case with an autoimmune disease called Multiple Sclerosis (MS) where the body attacks its own neurons by destroying the myelin that is necessary to transmit signals between neurons. People who have healthy habits and nothing wrong with themselves suddenly develop it when they are between 20 and 40 years old and in the prime of their life. Something as simple as the myelin around axons getting destroyed has such a huge effect on the nervous system. The nervous system controls every other system in our bodies and makes changes on a second-by-second basis. That is why the sheath around axons, which make it possible to transmit signals, getting destroyed is so detrimental. The brain may have disorders that are more than physical changes or problems. They make a person have a hard time functioning and they may have difficulty with reality.  Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is an example of a mental disorder. This is when a person may have two or more identities or personalities (Gabbard, 2005). The personality may change depending on the environment or the situation the person is in and there may be some memory loss between personalities as they do not coexist. These are diseases that occur in the brain, but drugs can also cause problems within the brain.

Drugs are a very highly debated subject right now, especially since the legalization of marijuana. And there are many different aspects of drugs. They can either be synthetically made through chemical reactions in a lab or they can be isolated from certain plants. Drugs can be administered in many different ways including injection, oral, smoked, or inhaled. They can be used medically for their positive effects, but those same drugs can be abused just like illegal drugs. Depressants, stimulants, cannabis, hallucinogens, inhalants, narcotics, or designer drugs are the different varieties of drugs. However, one thing that all these have in common is that they alter the brain by affecting the chemistry and communication within it. Neurotransmitters are chemicals that naturally occur within the brain and cause a certain signal and reaction to occur. One neuron will create and release a neurotransmitter that is released into the synapse, or space between two connecting neurons, and bind to the respective receptor on the other neuron to cause a reaction to occur. Once the neurons have communicated, the neurotransmitters either attach to a new receptor, absorbed into the pre-neuron, or are broken up by enzymes. Drugs can affect neurotransmitters by binding to receptors which cause a buildup of that associated neurotransmitters, mimicking the neurotransmitter and causing a greater reaction, inhibit the reuptake of neurotransmitters, or increase the production of a neurotransmitter. There are many neurotransmitters that have been discovered and their reactions have been recorded.

There are many different neurotransmitters that each have a specific role and drugs can affect either a specific neurotransmitter or a class of them. The neurotransmitters that can be affected by drugs are: dopamine, serotonin, acetylcholine, and glutamate. Those are individual neurotransmitters, but drugs can affect classes of neurotransmitters such as endogenous opioids, endogenous cannabinoids, and gamma-aminobutyric acid. They have different functions and different drugs affect them. (Impacts of Drugs on Neurotransmission, 2020).  Neurotransmitters affect every part of the mind and body which makes disrupting the natural order an issue. Those are illegal drugs and they are so for a reason, but there may be cases that drugs are important and that is why there are prescription drugs. 

Prescription drugs are prescribed to help a person. For example, someone who is in pain will be prescribed an opioid (Prescription Drugs, 2020). This is still altering the brain so they must be regulated and managed properly. That is why only licensed people can prescribe these medications and they must be controlled so they are not misused. Some doctors do not see new patients on Friday afternoons to avoid the addicts from coming to them to get medications before the weekend. When a person dies on hospice, the family is taught to properly destroy the medications so the strong pain killers can not be taken by someone else. No matter the kind of drug, whether it is prescription or illegal, they all alter the brain which can have serious consequences. I work at a hospice and experienced a change in a patient. She had many specialists (kidney, heart, general practitioner) who all assigned her several drugs to fix the problems in their areas. She was put on hospice because her kidneys were functioning at 30% and at that rate, she would only get worse. Since she was put on hospice, her life expectancy was six months. On top of that, she was not lucid and kept trying to commit suicide. When she was put on, our medical director took her off everything except her eye drops and a blood thinner because everything she was on was negatively affecting each other. That was six months ago and in her most recent blood work it shows that everything is perfect. Her kidneys are functioning perfectly, all her levels are good, and you can even see that she is more interactive, she can get up on her own, and she seems normal. She is not even hospice eligible anymore. I think that is just a testament about how you cannot take drugs, even prescription, for granted. They affect your mind, and your overall body, in ways you may not be able to predict. Not to say that there should not be prescription drugs, because they do help and have their place, but you have to be conscious of the side effects and how everything will interact.

The brain is a very complicated organ. It has many parts that help keep a person functioning. It has neurons and neurotransmitters which are chemicals used for communication. It can be physically damaged, mentally damaged, or damage itself. Drugs alter the chemistry and communication that happens within the brain and can have serious consequences. This fine-tuned organ has to be taken care of because it is responsible for everything that happens within the body. Having the most complicated organ in the universe has to be cared for and not taken for granted.

Works Cited

Bey, T., & Ostick, B. (2009, February). Second impact syndrome. Retrieved October 21, 2020, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2672291/

Gabbard, G. O., M.D. (2005). Mind, Brain, and Personality Disorders. Am J Psychiatry, (162), 648-655.

Lobes of the brain. (2018, July 17). Retrieved October 21, 2020, from https://qbi.uq.edu.au/brain/brain-anatomy/lobes-brain

National Institute on Drug Abuse. (2020, June 04). Impacts of Drugs on Neurotransmission. Retrieved October 28, 2020, from https://www.drugabuse.gov/news-events/nida-notes/2017/03/impacts-drugs-neurotransmission

National Institute on Drug Abuse. (2020, October 05). Prescription Medicines. Retrieved October 30, 2020, from https://www.drugabuse.gov/drug-topics/prescription-medicines

Pfaller, A. Y., Nelson, L. D., Apps, J. N., Walter, K. D., & Mccrea, M. A. (2016). Frequency and Outcomes of a Symptom-Free Waiting Period After Sport-Related Concussion. The American Journal of Sports Medicine, 44(11), 2941-2946. doi:10.1177/0363546516651821

The forebrain. (2018, October 15). Retrieved October 21, 2020, from https://qbi.uq.edu.au/brain/brain-anatomy/forebrain

The midbrain. (2018, July 04). Retrieved October 21, 2020, from https://qbi.uq.edu.au/brain/brain-anatomy/midbrain

The hindbrain. (2018, July 04). Retrieved October 21, 2020, from https://qbi.uq.edu.au/brain/brain-anatomy/hindbrain