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What happens in the brain when we die? Deciphering the neurophysiology of the final moments in life

When do we die and what happens in the brain when we die? The mystery around these questions has engaged mankind for centuries. Despite the challenges to obtain recordings of the dying brain, recent studies have contributed to better understand the processes occurring during the last moments of life...

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Autores principales: Shlobin, Nathan A., Aru, Jaan, Vicente, Raul, Zemmar, Ajmal
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10203241/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37228251
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnagi.2023.1143848
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author Shlobin, Nathan A.
Aru, Jaan
Vicente, Raul
Zemmar, Ajmal
author_facet Shlobin, Nathan A.
Aru, Jaan
Vicente, Raul
Zemmar, Ajmal
author_sort Shlobin, Nathan A.
collection PubMed
description When do we die and what happens in the brain when we die? The mystery around these questions has engaged mankind for centuries. Despite the challenges to obtain recordings of the dying brain, recent studies have contributed to better understand the processes occurring during the last moments of life. In this review, we summarize the literature on neurophysiological changes around the time of death. Perhaps the only subjective description of death stems from survivors of near-death experiences (NDEs). Hallmarks of NDEs include memory recall, out-of-body experiences, dreaming, and meditative states. We survey the evidence investigating neurophysiological changes of these experiences in healthy subjects and attempt to incorporate this knowledge into the existing literature investigating the dying brain to provide valuations for the neurophysiological footprint and timeline of death. We aim to identify reasons explaining the variations of data between studies investigating this field and provide suggestions to standardize research and reduce data variability.
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spelling pubmed-102032412023-05-24 What happens in the brain when we die? Deciphering the neurophysiology of the final moments in life Shlobin, Nathan A. Aru, Jaan Vicente, Raul Zemmar, Ajmal Front Aging Neurosci Aging Neuroscience When do we die and what happens in the brain when we die? The mystery around these questions has engaged mankind for centuries. Despite the challenges to obtain recordings of the dying brain, recent studies have contributed to better understand the processes occurring during the last moments of life. In this review, we summarize the literature on neurophysiological changes around the time of death. Perhaps the only subjective description of death stems from survivors of near-death experiences (NDEs). Hallmarks of NDEs include memory recall, out-of-body experiences, dreaming, and meditative states. We survey the evidence investigating neurophysiological changes of these experiences in healthy subjects and attempt to incorporate this knowledge into the existing literature investigating the dying brain to provide valuations for the neurophysiological footprint and timeline of death. We aim to identify reasons explaining the variations of data between studies investigating this field and provide suggestions to standardize research and reduce data variability. Frontiers Media S.A. 2023-05-09 /pmc/articles/PMC10203241/ /pubmed/37228251 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnagi.2023.1143848 Text en Copyright © 2023 Shlobin, Aru, Vicente and Zemmar. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Aging Neuroscience
Shlobin, Nathan A.
Aru, Jaan
Vicente, Raul
Zemmar, Ajmal
What happens in the brain when we die? Deciphering the neurophysiology of the final moments in life
title What happens in the brain when we die? Deciphering the neurophysiology of the final moments in life
title_full What happens in the brain when we die? Deciphering the neurophysiology of the final moments in life
title_fullStr What happens in the brain when we die? Deciphering the neurophysiology of the final moments in life
title_full_unstemmed What happens in the brain when we die? Deciphering the neurophysiology of the final moments in life
title_short What happens in the brain when we die? Deciphering the neurophysiology of the final moments in life
title_sort what happens in the brain when we die? deciphering the neurophysiology of the final moments in life
topic Aging Neuroscience
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10203241/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37228251
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnagi.2023.1143848
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