There is a brain circuit being developed that could curtail risky behavior, reducing atrocities such as mass shootings. There is a catch - the circuit has to be put in the brain.

A Circuit For The Brain

Wouldn't it be nice if there was a device you could put in the brain that would help stop risky behavior from happening, like a mass shooting or a murder. Such a device is being researched at the College of Medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina, which has discovered a brain circuit that inhibits motivated behaviors

This report comes from nature Communications that the circuit is in a region of the brain called the thalamus. When active this can prevent reward seeking Behavior which people often do to seek a thrill in this model blocking or inhibiting the circuit leads to reward seeking even in high risk contexts

Administering opioids causes immediate and significant disruption of this circuit, which results in even riskier behaviors. The findings from the study addressed an understudied area of addiction research and emphasizes A New Perspective for studying and treating Addiction in those who have not been able to beat it

The behavior of someone can be thought of a car that is approaching an intersection, for the car to move forward the brake must be released, and the gas pedal must be pressed or in the case of an EV the accelerator must be pressed to give energy to the vehicle.

Research has largely focused on this acceleration, identifying brain regions and circuits that reward this thrill seeking behavior and hazardous decision-making. However, this fails and a major component of addiction which is not being able to stop the risky behavior from happening in the first place needs to be addressed

Examining Risky Behavior and Stopping It

In order to find a potential circuit that would put on the brakes for risky behavior, researchers have focused on the thalamus part of the brain, which has been known to integrate environmental and internal information that guides feeding and reward seeking.

The brain activity has been examined in a preclinical model of the thrill-seeking behavior using an advanced imaging method called two Photon microscopy. Using this Cutting Edge technique the team could make and identify individual brain cells that were inhibited during reward and thrill seeking, and it would be just like a brake that has to be released to drive forward

There is much more to this development of this brain circuit technology, but the point is there might be a way for people who cannot overcome addiction to overcome addiction. This would save a lot of people who are addicted to opioids or other drugs that don't have the willpower to stop them.

I look forward to Future developments in this technology and seeing people being able to consciously choose to adopt the brain circuit to stop their harmful, risky and in some cases fatal Behavior.

What do you think of this technology, should people be allowed to choose it, or should people be forced to have it?