Neurogenesis and Neuroplasticity: It's Not All Its Cracked Up to Be

Lot's of sites that deal with tinnitus information, such as "do's and don't's", often posit that one should exercise and do other things that promote neurogenesis (a process by which new neurons are created) and neuroplasticity (in which existing neurons extend their dendrites to make new neural connections to compensate for loss of gray matter or cell death). In contrast, these sites recommend avoiding things that inhibit and harm both processes.

However, I am here to shed some light on why this advice is not all its cracked up to be, and why promoting these two things is in some cases not helpful, AND harmful.

The brain has two types of cell tissues: white matter and gray matter. Gray matter refers to the physical neurons that populate the brain. Individual cells that work together in various cortical and subcortical areas. Humans gradually lose gray matter with age, and will cell death come denretic extension through neuroplasticity. These dendrites and axons make up white matter, which are simply connections between living cells in the brain. Cell death causes gray matter loss, leading to an increase in connectivity (or white matter) to try and compensate. It's your brain's way of trying (and not always succeeding) to do more with less.

In general, loss of gray matter and increase in connectivity is not a good thing. The brain in tinnitus patients has been shown to undergo gray matter loss in various areas of the brain. I will note that gray matter loss doesn't always equate cell death, as some neurons may simply be re-purposed to another area. In some patients, gray matter increases have been observed in areas like the thalamus. Research has been fairly inconsistent as far as structural change in gray and white matter are concerned, but we do seem to lose gray matter and possibly gain white matter.

As positive as this may seem, here is the kicker: neuroplasticity is increasingly thought to be the culprit behind the generation and proliferation of the tinnitus signal. The brain dislikes having a gap in hearing induced my peripheral cochlear lesions, so it tries to compensate by reducing gray matter and increasing white matter to prevent gray matter loss in the Primary Auditory Cortex. As we can see, these changes become more dense and solidified over time. Thus, it is my opinion that NMDA receptor antagonists, which the brain desperately relies on for neuroplasticity, should be inhibited and blocked so the brain CANNOT make the changes it needs.

Finally is neurogenesis. It is often the case that people promote antidepressant use and exercise as promoting neurogenesis, the growth of new neurons in the adult brain. I'm here to tell you that really isn't something that occurs in adult humans. Humans are born with the maximum number of neurons you will ever have. Shortly after birth, once your neurons have been forged and migrated to where they need to be, a massive cell death (known as apoptosis) occurs. From there on out, neurogensis does not occur in 99% of the brain, meaning most gray matter loss and cell death is permanent.

Neurogensis is thought to occur in humans in two areas of the brain. The first is the Olfactory Bulb, our smell center. The second is the hippocampus, a structure crucial for memory formation, emotional regulation, and and many other vital functions. The alleged neurogensis of the hippocampus is overstated. I read a paper from this year that postulates that neurogenesis does not actually occur at all in humans. Their studied samples were not the best, so I will assume that is wrong. Even still, NG only occurs in the Dentate Gyrus of the hippocampus, whose new cell replication is limited throughout the lifespan and whose new neurons have very limited migration ability.

This means, as stated, that 99% of all cell death in the brain is permanent. If you lose cells in your Broca's Area, those are never coming back. So, do not rely on antidepressants, exercise, or anything else for that matter to have NG or NP be your savior. They may help, but NP creates tinnitus in the first place, so it should be inhibited to force the brain to live with an imbalance. And finally, NG is very limited beyond infancy and is not going to help you recover 99% of cells you lose from stress, anxiety, or depression.

 

One thing for sure Glowout your brain is way better than mine, have to idea what I just read. Keep it up , smart guy.

 

@Gl0w0ut man, you really need to get a degree in neuroscience, you would make for an excellent tinnitus researcher..!

 

You should become a neuroscientist, if restoring hearing loss doesn't undo tinnitus we have Susan Shores device which will most likely come before hearing regeneration.

if neither work i can just off myself. But yeah good job posting inconvenient facts about grey matter.

 

Man this is depressing but most likely true. Nature is shit

 

Well I would rather you not off yourself. To be honest, I posted this in sort of a rage, but it remains true for the most part. Even if neruogenesis does occur, it is restricted to two very specific regions of the brain. I think it is dangerous to promote it as a panacea to treating cognitive decline from disease of the mind and body when it is often over-represented in its effects.

The study I referenced was published earlier this year, and is the first of its kind to challenge the decades old norm of neurogenesis in adults. There are some caveats I will note about the study, the biggest one being the sampled brains they analyzed. Unlike previous studies positing adult neurogenesis, they did analyze human brains and not animal brains. The brains came from two samples: dead brains and living brains of patients with severe epilepsy. Both should be taken with a grain of salt, as dead patients cannot be truly reliable and epileptic patients who are having surgery likely have neural damage from their seizures. Healthy, "normal" in vivo (living) brains have not yey been examined.

A lot of research on disease is pretty depressing. Don't read anything on depression. If you think tinnitus research is bad, you ain't see nothing yet. To be honest though, even if these were not the case, they still wouldn't really help stop the noise. As I said, many researchers indicate tinnitus as a byproduct of maladaptive neuroplastic response in the brain due to cochlear lesions. Thus, we would need to restore signals from the periphery, or cochlea, to hopefully stop the signals. The burst firing in the brain stem is, from what I have read, due to over-excitement from glutamate release, which NMDA antagonist could stop.

In short, even if I was wrong, it still wouldn't help fix tinnitus.

 

I don't know if I presented all of the information above correctly, so don't just take my word for it.

 

I don't know, neurogenesis and plasticity still isn't that well understood from what I gather.

This is what I was going to ask of your original post, but you have already answered that. From what I've read, which is definitely not as much as you, depression and other mental conditions cause damage to many regions of the brain. But, until those examinations are completed, and examinations of ''recovered brains (however that would be defined)'', we can't really definitively know the extent, and reversibility, of the damage caused. You're obviously very intelligent and would probably have a bright future in neuroscience, but I can't help but think that you are a bit biased towards the negative (even though it's visible that you're trying to stay unbiased). I see often posts from you defining why your brain is permanently damaged and could never recover, which only serves to push you deeper into depression.

Maybe that's how it has to be, for a good analysis to be found, but what I'm trying to say is, try not to think all of this is fact set in stone. Assume it is right, but try to prove it wrong. When I was trying to read research into this, which I will be doing again soon, it was such a roller coaster of emotion going from study to study that directly contradict eachother and them constantly popping up over time.

In any case, you are onto something, but don't let your findings and regrets kill you. If that's too hard to stay true to, then do so at least until you know for a fact that what's been done, can't be undone. Which I think you should try hard to prove it can be undone. If everyone despaired all the time over what's lost we would never gain anything...

Anyway, keep doing the good work you're doing, and really consider becoming a neurological researcher, but don't let it be your downfall.

 

I really hate to break it to you, but this thesis/term paper that you just typed up, looks very educational... but 100% false and just biased from a negative standpoint. I go to the gym each morning at 730 or 830 and lift weights for 30 minutes, then get on an intense cardio treadmill for 20 minutes. Then I will go to my MMA class that same day. I train 5-6 days a week and my BP is at 123/63 and my tinnitus is even less noticeable to me now. if you want to type something that is helpful, please make it factual.

Exercise is the BEST thing for people that suffer from tinnitus. It helps them naturally, get out those negative emotions and it makes the mind tired and not have to think or listen to the tinnitus or the sound. Distraction is the KEY to not think about the tinnitus and the sound. I don't post here much anymore, but when I see stuff that is pure rubbish, I will come in and make a point.

You seem like a bright guy, but your efforts are on the wrong things and you need to stop reading into this stuff and actually moving forward and past all this gloom and negativity.......

Exercise is great and folks can get in better shape, not listen as much to their tinnitus. Deal with depression and stress naturally and not be on meds. My points are always valid, if people listen good, if not thats ok as well

PS-you can do any exercise, that is safe for you and your tinnitus.

Fish....

 

I'm going to try and respond in a non-condescending way. Your argument that exercise helps improve tinnitus does NOT, in any way, shape, or form discredit or disprove my argument that NG and NP are not as helpful as medical science likes to claim. As I addressed in another thread, exercise CAN lower tinnitus by lowering blood pressure, which decreases hyperactivity. That happens independent of NP and NG. When you want to ACTUALLY address my claim instead of saying I'm 100% wrong because of an independent phenomenon, feel free to reply.

 

Of course I have an emotional bias, it's a defining characteristic of being neurotic and depressed. Most gray matter loss, stemming from true cell death, is permanent. Even if NG occurs as science claims it has for nearly three decades, it still doesn't change the fact that it is restricted to two small regions of the brain. Your brain retains NP throughout life, but NP is a partial casual factor in the onset and proliferation of tinnitus.

As for my negativity, of course I'm negative. I'm bitter that I had to be born with a neurodevelopment disorder, that I inherited a family history of depression, that I have anxiety issues. All of which generate a ton of cortisol, which is extremely neurotoxic to the hippocampus and shrinks it. Resulting in poorer memory and poorer mood regulation. And of course, the brain not only protects the amygdala from this damage but grows and promotes it. If I had my choice, I would direct some of that excess cortisol into the amygdala and cause severe cell death in my fear and anxiety regions. I would also damage neighboring dendrites so they cannot be extended to replace them and make new connections. Thereby depriving the brain of that function forever.

 

I wasn't judging your negativity, and I recognize that what you say is for the most part verified and most likely true. Your posts are very informative and useful for understanding the condition and its repercussions on the brain of course, but it seems that that's all you focus on. In fact I'm glad that there's someone that's showing the grim reality of these conditions. My only problem is that it seems that's all you're posting, and I don't imagine that has any benefit for your mental state at all.

Anyways, I didn't mean to offend or anger you, like I said, your posts are good reads. Truth shouldn't be avoided. If we avoid the truth, we won't be able to find any medical resolutions for this condition. But I think you should try to look at the other side of the coin sometimes too.

 

Okay.
What is the end goal here?
I appreciate the dedication to work out myth from fact. (Particularly so for a lot of the bogus treatments that seem to be circulating tinnitus and pretty much the entirety of alternative medicine)
But I mean… Are we trying to dissuade people from exercising and using antidepressants? Because the former EVERYONE should do no matter who they are and the latter keeps a significant chunk of people on this earth functioning.

If the purpose of the thread is just to be informative I question its place in the support forum. But then the organizational methods of this website in general have always been a mystery to me.

If there is any disappointment at all it is that this line in particular is not expounded on throughout Daniel's post. I have so much self-hatred. I can scarcely imagine a person who hates themself more than I do. My entire adult life has been a series of revolving terrible mistakes that have only screwed me over in the end. The only thing I have learned is that I am too numb to keep crying. I can't cry over every mistake I make (including the big ones) because then I will never be able to move on and find happiness. This is a part of yourself that you will need to grieve and mourn for, the same way as if you had lost a loved one. I hope that you will be able to find peace soon.

In the meantime, seeing as how you have self awareness on this matter, you recognize that you have depression. You state in all the ways you would biologically fix your body. The latter, in particular, is impossible for anyone to do. Humans are animals. We will always be animals. We will always have instincts. We will always be enslaved to how we evolved. We are not perfectly self-aware. We are unique but we are not special. So we are capable of free thought. This does not mean that the human body should be, by design, infallible, or even make sense! It's not the luna moth's fault that their adult forms have no mouths. It certainly would make sense for them to have some wouldn't it? You know what also does it make sense? That the female human body is so inefficient at birthing that results in such high mortality rates without modernization.

Evolution doesn't care about that though. It doesn't care about the moths having mouths. It doesn't care if human women have wide enough hips. It doesn't care if you have tinnitus.

But you are able to acknowledge yourself as neurotic and depressed. You can say just exactly how you would like to wire the human brain, why can't you use that energy on your own depression? That would be a more objective approach.

 

A well written post as usual @fishbone and it's nice to see you back aboard where you belong. Someone of your vast experience in tinnitus and management needs to be here to help others cope with this condition when they are having a difficult time with it..

I agree @Gl0w0ut is bright and writes well which I've said on more than one occasion. I also agree his attempt at dealing with tinnitus from a scientific point of view and his copious amounts of reading about the brain and tinnitus, will as you and I know, teach him absolutely nothing about how to live and manage with it. He will in time learn this, but at the moment he believes we have got it all wrong. He is a new broom that's going to "sweep clean" but we veterans know the corners.

All the best
Michael

 

Regular exercise improves circulation, detoxifies the body, decreases stress and improves the quality of sleep. For those with tinnitus, exercise can be a well being positive as endorphin release helps with overall wellness.

There are certain exercises that can worsen tinnitus according to Dr. Michael Weintraub of the New York Medical College. He did a study and discovered an association for those with tinnitus and jarring of the head with high-impact exercise. Jarring of the head for those with tinnitus can cause otoconia, calcium crystals in the ears to be jarred out causing increasing inner ear problems. He said that basketball, soccer, running, football or high-impact aeorobics should be done in moderation, if at all.

Other studies have shown that high-impact exercise can be harmful for those with physical tinnitus of the neck and jaw. That's very understandable, but there's too much to discuss in a few paragraphs.

I did a lot of exercising after my first non physical tinnitus onset. Now with physical whiplash tinnitus I can barely move my neck, jaw, mouth and face. I say if one with tinnitus can exercise without a lot of high-impact then try it.

 

I have already acknowledged the benefits of exercise in another thread where I plainly admit I was wrong. People falsely claim exercise also generate NG, which mT be false, and NP, which has a hand in causing tinnitus. That was it.

Also I've come to dislike exercise. It makes me sore and tired, and even with endorphins, makes me want to avoid doing it.

 

What's your point, exactly? I'm self aware, so that means what exactly? That I should work to fix it? My being self aware is what makes me neurotic and depressed in the first place.

However I'm not going to entertain this any longer. You can either address my argument or private message me. This thread is for the topic at hand.

 

You didn't anger me. You just caught me in a bad mood. To be honest, I don't focus on the "good side" of the coin because I fail to see any hope for this condition. ENTs and audioologists don't care about our suffering beyond how they can line their pockets.

 

Yes the ENT's and the medical community as a whole is pretty much useless here...aside from some theories and some isolated trials, there really is nothing concrete or helpful available for this condition.
I suspect that big pharma is not exactly interested in finding a cure either, as there is likely much more money to be made in selling benzos and various antidepressants instead.

 

As I have always said, one of the biggest keys to success with tinnitus.... is doing something that helps us take our attention away from the ringing. Such articles just provide, false info for those that suffer. Our lives could be somewhat limited due to the ringing. Cutting out exercise is the worst thing one can do. Exercise provides tons of benefits:

Distraction from the tinnitus (Crucial)
helps us sleep
helps with cholestrol
helps with losing weight
helps with blood pressure
helps lubricate muscle joints
helps with depression/anxiety

Tons of benefits come out of exercising. Try to exercise at least 10-15 mins 3 times a week folks.....

I know that people suffer here and our goal is to help them and not send them backwards in their lives. This article is provides no help for anyone and just mentally paints another negative image, that we CANNOT do something. Tinnitus does that enough, we don't need another clutter in the mind. I use myself and my stories to prove that things can change, things can get better. I am like all of the members here, but my willpower and mindset is VERY different.

 

Well said @fishbone and I agree with you wholeheartedly. Distraction is one of the most important things in helping a person to cope with tinnitus and habituate. It covers many things and levels. A good place to start is with exercise as you've said. Going out for a walk gives so much benefit to the mind and body.

All the best
Michael

 

@fishbone, I agree and sing from the same hyme sheet.

 

@Gl0wOut The only part of your opening post that's neuro science debatable is your discussion of neurogenesis and the key word - exercise, which is mentioned in this link as a benefit. Read the part on BDNF and exercise.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-david-perlmutter-md/neurogenesis-what-it-mean_b_777163.html

 

There are some very interesting differences, and vastly different approaches on TT.

It seems that some people ‘get their rocks off’ by dwelling on the impossibility of any brain cell regeneration or improvement.
The misery seems to really set them alight, and keep them motivated.
That’s their daily emotional meal catered for.

Others indulge a predeliction for ‘memes,’ the emphasis of which appears to be cynical ‘piss-taking’ for want of a better term.
Ultimately just a tad boring, if I’m honest.

Then we have guys like Fish, who prove to themselves day after day, that physical activity and exercise bring tremendous benefits to both the body and the psyche.

Of these three approaches, I see no real contest.
Er........@Ed209.......I don’t have a song sheet,
mind if I look over your shoulder, so we can both sing along together.......er.......quietly.

PS - welcome back @fishbone - we need your wisdom on here buddy x

 

For God sake's, it never said "don't exercise". I have an entire thread where I profess being wrong about that and state it's potential benefits. I mention exercise because it and antidepressants are said to help initiate NP and NG. All I said was that NG isn't as cracked up as pop science makes it to be and that NP shouldn't be wholly trusted, as NP is part of initiating tinnitus in the brain. This isn't hard.

 

This is NOT about exercise. Reread my post and you will see that. I only mention exercise because it is often stated to spur NG, which may not actually occur in human adults after all:

 

I don't believe in the word IMPOSSIBLE.....Everything in life is POSSIBLE!!!! Only the mind can separate these TWOs. Only our actions can separate these TWOs....

 

@GlOwOut - I was just having a bit of fun GLO.
......er......is that still allowed on here?

- sometimes I wonder?
Wouldn’t like to get ‘banged-up’ for it! x

 

I admit my ignorance on brain chemistry, but this is not the first time I'm reading that the NMDA receptors and glutamate might be at the center of this sh*t show called tinnitus.
Maybe a stupid question, but could the NMDA receptors or the glutamate be somehow inhibited, disabled, redirected or killed alltogether?

 

@Wolfears This link discusses your questions and what research is needed for drug therapy. Not all with tinnitus have hearing loss so glutamate inhabitation isn't the full answer for all with tinnitus.

This brings into focus that many with complicated physical tinnitus interaction and disease are in a separate group. Very few of the regulars on this board are in this separate group.

http://cochranelibrary-wiley.com/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD012391/full