But the hormonal cascade engineered by the amygdala and the BNST, it turns out, is only one piece of the puzzle. In recent years, new techniques have come online that have allowed researchers to begin to trace the "circuits" of the brain in even greater detail and to better understand how disparate parts of the brain interact—creating both widespread excitement and the sense that there is a lot more to learn. Since 2011, Tye, of the Salk Institute, has been using genetically-modified light-sensitive proteins to turn neurons on and off, and systematically tracing the connections between different parts of the brain involved in fear and anxiety.
但是，由杏仁核和终纹床核设计的激素级联只是这个谜题的一部分。近年来，新技术已经上线，这使得研究人员能够开始更详细地追踪大脑的“回路”，并更好地理解大脑不同部分是如何相互作用的——这既让人兴奋，也让人觉得还有很多东西要学。自2011年以来，索尔克研究所的泰伊一直在使用基因改良的光敏蛋白来开启和关闭神经元，并系统地追踪大脑中涉及恐惧和焦虑的不同部分之间的联系。
Her work has added to a growing body of evidence that brain structures other than the amygdala and BNST play a role in anxiety. These include the prefrontal cortex, the hippocampus, the cingulate gyrus and a number of other areas.
越来越多的证据表明，除了杏仁核和终纹床核外，大脑结构也在焦虑中发挥作用。这些区域包括前额皮质、海马体、扣带回和其他一些区域。
"If you think of an analogy of the brain being like the world, and neurons being like people, and you want to understand how information is propagated across the world, you would say, 'yeah, it's important to know where someone lives, I guess,'" she explains. "But it's way more important to know what they're saying, who they're saying it to, who's listening and how do the people that are listening respond? How are those messages sent and filtered to different corners of the brain?"
“如果你把大脑比作世界，把神经元比作人，你想了解信息是如何在世界各地传播的，那么你会说，‘是的，我想知道某人住在哪里是很重要的，”她解释道。“但更重要的是要知道他们在说什么，他们在对谁说，谁在听，听的人如何回应？这些信息是如何被发送并过滤到大脑的不同角落的？”
These findings make the focus on the amygdala and even the BNST seem outdated. LeDoux, the scientist many credit with establishing the importance of the amygdala, is quick to agree. Like Nixon in China, LeDoux has been proselytizing his colleagues to pay more attention to the contributions of the higher-order structures in the anxiety circuit. What parts of the brain the amygdala and BNST are "talking to" may eventually prove crucial in finding more effective ways of treating anxiety.
这些发现使得对杏仁核甚至终纹床核的关注显得过时了。
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