Scientists Prevent Brain-Cell Suicide to Keep Birds Singing

Some birds, caged or not, only sing when they really need to, namely, during the breeding season. After it's over, their musical neurons die-off, and they are left tune-less.

But now, scientists at the University of Washington have shown they can keep the birds singing, temporarily, by stopping the action of an enzyme key to their brains' natural cell-death processes. As cell-death mechanisms are similar across species, the research could open up new avenues of research on degenerative and age-related diseases like Alzheimer's.

Programmed cell death, or apoptosis, is common in multicellular organisms and aids important biological processes, like maintaining homeostasis and acting as the chisel in skeletal development. While there are many reasons that a cell could sense it is supposed to die, the actual suicide process is generally the same: A group of enzymes called caspases execute on the order for cellular degeneration.

What the researchers have shown in work to be published tomorrow in the Journal of Neuroscience is that inhibiting the caspases preserves neurons and brain-region function; in this case, singing.

"In the future, physicians might be able to stabilize people who have suffered a stroke using these inhibitors," said Eliot Brenowitz, a University of Washington professor of psychology and zoology, in a release.

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