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Journal of Undergraduate Research

Keywords

anesthesia, midbrain GABA neurons, consciousness, VTA, ventral tegmental area

College

Family, Home, and Social Sciences

Department

Psychology

Abstract

Consciousness has perplexed neuroscientists for decades. What is consciousness and how is it obstructed by anesthesia? Every year doctors expose thousands of people to general anesthesia. Anesthesia does several things, it prevents the perception of pain, renders a patient unconscious, inhibits the formation of memory, and paralyzes the subject; all of which as desired during a medical procedure. The mechanism by which anesthesia accomplishes these many tasks are unknown, including its ability to render a subject unconscious. The goal of this study was to study the effects of anesthesia on -aminobutyric acid (GABA) neurons in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) in an attempt to further understand the role that VTA-GABA neurons play in consciousness.

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