Do “mini-brains” have consciousness?
Mini-brains grown in a dish develop spontaneous activity similar to patterns seen in premature babies
Researchers from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) have discovered spontaneous brain waves in lab-grown mini-brains that resembled electrical patterns seen in premature babies. They presented their work at the Society for Neuroscience conference held at San Diego during the first week of November.
I was attending a course last week and as a preparation for the course we had to write a news article on any topic we wanted. I was in quite a fix. I could choose from a wide variety of topics to write about. But to limit it to 200 words, now that was a difficult task. So I went on a hunt, looking for the latest and most interesting science news which would also be easy to write about. Normally we come across a lot of science news every day. But very few topics have caught my interest so quickly in the past. This article about mini-brains published in Nature news was one among them.
So what was in the news that got me so excited?
A team of researchers from UCSD had developed mini-brains, specifically cortical tissues — a brain region that controls higher-order functions — from human stem cells. They grew these mini-brains in culture for 10 months and recorded their electrical as well as their gene expression patterns. The mini-brains expressed the same genes seen in developing human brains. But scientists were particularly interested in the electrical pattern of these mini-brains. These mini-brains, by 6 months of age, were firing at a high rate and the rhythm was similar to the electrical patterns recorded in premature babies. According to the news article, the team had presented their results at the Society for Neuroscience conference during the first week of November.
I have mentioned the term “Mini-brains” so many times now. But what exactly are they? Mini-brains are just a fancy name for the scientific term “brain organoids”. Brain organoids are three-dimensional tissues generated from stem cells. Stem cells have the ability to grow into any types of cells, for example, skin cells. The stem cells are in a way “coaxed” to form the tissues from the brain cortex in a dish by feeding it the right nutrients. Growing tissues this way in the lab provides us with various opportunities, especially to study brain development. These mini-brains open new doors for researchers studying early brain development since it is difficult to obtain fetal tissues or to examine the fetus in utero.
Of course, a development like this would have many researchers on “cloud nine”. It surely caught my attention and made me read more. This new development could be useful not only in understanding the brain development but also give us a tool to study developmental disorders like autism and epilepsy.
But this is where a controversy pops up.
Of course, in science there are always disagreements — supporters and non-supporters of a theory. But in this particular case, many talk of the ethical concerns this new development might raise. The results from the team’s work do show that the electrical patterns of the mini-brains are similar to those seen in premature babies. The question here is: “If these mini-brains are allowed to mature, would they develop consciousness?” But what do we know about consciousness? Is there even a way of studying consciousness?
Coincidentally (if you believe in “coincidences”), only a week before the deadline for the homework, my friends and I were discussing the same topic over dinner. We were talking about the ethics of scientific methods and how far we would go for the sake of scientific research. Hence, the minute I read the story, I knew this was exactly what I wanted to write about.
From what I have read, till date, there has never been a consensus on how consciousness can be measured. Whether consciousness is a measurable factor still remains an enigma for scientists. Of course, the mini-brains are nowhere close to the fully developed human brain. They only have some cell types of the cortex. And it is not known whether they will form connections with organoids of other brain regions. The lab has future plans of growing the organoids longer and looking for further maturation. But if there is still a long way to go, where do the ethical concerns come from?
I do agree that as scientists we have to follow certain ethics and rules. But would applying ethical rules to miniature brains grown in a dish and being conscious, count as taking it too far? If something as artificial as mini-brains is considered human-like, then many of the advances in science would probably be stunted. There would be no amazing discoveries, and maybe brain disorders will remain a mystery, forever. Most importantly, there will be no new therapeutic strategies that would finally cure these disorders.
If you ask me, there is no right or wrong answer to this question. As a scientist I strongly believe that such developments are necessary to investigate many unanswered questions about the brain, given the difficulties in studying human brains. And hence I would support the use of mini-brains for research, irrespective of whether they develop a consciousness of their own. Not because I don’t understand or believe in rising ethical concerns. But rather because, as scientists we should also understand the pressing need for such advancements to be able to truly understand brain disorders. We have to draw a line somewhere.
UPDATE: This article was updated on 6th December 2018. A mistake was made earlier where in several places instead of “consciousness” the word “conscience” was used. It has now been corrected.
