The researchers identified special cells, called “Grid cells”, which are activated at a regular rate as a person moves, functioning as an internal stopwatch that measures the distances traveled.
The study, published in Current Biology magazine, has shown through experiments on rats and human volunteers that these cells in the brain area responsible for memory and orientation function as a clock-ie I do tic-tac-constantly during travel.
“The more regular the activation model, the better the animals estimated the distance they had to travel,” explains Professor James Ainge, the main author of the study.
When the researchers changed the shape of the experimental arena, both rats and human participants began to make errors in estimating distances, because the internal stopwatch became irregular.
The discovery is important because these brain cells are in the area for the first time by Alzheimer’s, and their dysfunction causes the characteristic disorientation of the disease.
Researchers plan the development of “diagnosis” games for mobile phones to test the ability to estimate distances, thus offering a simple method of early Alzheimer’s detection.
