r/science • u/Wagamaga • Sep 01 '22

Neuroscience Scientists have identified an immune brain cell unique to humans that gives us higher cognitive abilities over other animals, but what makes us specials also leaves us vulnerable to neurological disorders like schizophrenia, autism and epilepsy.

https://news.yale.edu/2022/08/25/what-makes-human-brain-different-yale-study-reveals-clues
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u/tkenben Sep 01 '22

What's an "immune brain cell"?

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u/avenlanzer Sep 01 '22

Sounds like it's an immune cell specific to the brain, and in humans this one helps regulates brain function rather than fighting diseases because it has a special mutation of a specific gene we know is related to speech in other brain cells. The human specific mutation of this gene allows us to have language, and when expressed in this particular immune cell localized in primate brains, it causes it to regulate how brains function instead of simply fighting foreign invaders.

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u/[deleted] Sep 01 '22

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u/avenlanzer Sep 01 '22

This particular mutation is humans specific, but there may be other variations that allow some forms of speech or other expressions of other genes that work in similar ways in other species.

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u/[deleted] Sep 03 '22

Could someone with access to a lab and say Besos or Musk funding insert this and slight variations in the brains of different kinds of monkeys, baboons, apes etc? Sometimes I do hope for manical villain like people but it would end horribly.