“Translating Thought into Blood Flow in the Brain: Capillaries as Sensors of Neural Activity”

We have recently shown that brain capillaries act as a neural activity-sensing network by initiating and transmitting an electrical signal, mediated by potassium channel activation that propagates through the interconnected endothelial cells comprising the capillaries that line all blood vessels. This concept explains the rapid and coordinated delivery of blood to active neurons. Using a mouse model of a monogenic form of Singular Value Decomposition (SVD), we have discovered early defects that result in a loss of this electrical signaling mechanism and impaired delivery of blood to active neurons - defects that involve changes in extracellular matrix composition. Mark T. Nelson, Ph.D., Pharmacology Chair and Professor University of Vermont Larner College of Medicine