Do You Live in an Urban Area? You Might Have Magnets in Your Brain
New research shows that long-term exposure to industrial air pollution might contribute to diseases like Alzheimer’s by leaving tiny magnets in your brain. It sounds scary but don’t freak out and start buying weird anti-magnet supplements from some whack-o on the internet just yet. Here’s how it works…
We already know that living in a city means you’re at risk for developing health complications due to air pollution. But now researchers think they’ve figured out how: exposure to industrial pollution might be creating tiny magnetic particles in human brains. Eventually this can lead to cognitive disorders, depression, Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s. Which makes a lot of sense because these these are all health conditions that are also typically caused by exposure to heavy metals, like lead. There isn’t a direct link between magnetite particles and Alzheimer’s per se; but it creates a toxic environment that causes brain cells to misfire. Probably kind of like when you leave your debit card or phone next to a magnet but on a super micro scale.
Related: Scientists Have Figured Out How To Upload Information To Your Brain
Smokestacks on power plants are the main culprits for this type of pollution but nanomagnets can appear on brains naturally, too. However, researchers noticed that the nanomagnets produced organically were octahedral or tetrahedral while others were round. Which lead them to believe that the round ones were produced by environmental conditions like pollution. Well that, and brains with the round nanomagnets also had levels of cobalt or nickle– which cannot be organically produced in a human brain.
On the bright side, this guy thinks we can actually harness the power of these nanomagnets to do cool stuff. Joe Kirschvink has been studying nanomagnets in the brain for over 25 years and believes we used to have a “magnetic sense” that we’ve lost over time. Even if he’s right it probably wasn’t something as cool as being able to move objects with our mind; but more like the internal compass birds have. So maybe when someone with Alzheimer’s wonders out of the house they actually know exactly where they’re going by using the power of magnets and we just aren’t operating on the same level.
Joking aside, researchers still need to conduct more tests to make sure nanomagnets are actually causing brain disorders, but they’re pretty confident. Either way, the stuff probably isn’t doing our brains any good.
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Randi Nord lives in Pontiac, Michigan. She is a journalist for the The Fifth Column, co-founder of Geopolitics Alert, and co-hosts a podcast about geopolitics.