Researchers Identified the Brain's Electrical Activity Responsible for Migraines

Schiff serves as the university's Center for Neural Engineering, and he said he and his team haven't cured migraines. However, he said the discovery gets them several steps closer to solving a problem affecting millions each year. Roughly 10 percent of men and 22 percent of women in the United States suffer from migraines, according to the US Center for Disease Control. 

The team used computational models to understand the spreading depolarization in rat subjects. Their research was recently reported in an issue of Scientific Reports.

"The electrical activity in the brain causing the aura is like a rolling blackout," said Andrew J. Whalen, postdoctoral scholar, Center for Neural Engineering, Penn State. "It's not just a single cell, but a chain reaction that moves across the brain causing swelling, and it takes people a while to recover."

The Penn State team already knew that salt concentrations in the brain can alter the brain's electrical functions thanks to previous research. By altering the potassium concentrations in the brain, the team could affect the rate of depolarization.

"We thought that if we stopped the initial phase, the aura, we would stop the rest," said Schiff. "We finally figured out that the charge necessary to stop the spreading depression was opposite to what we assumed. Once we chose the opposite charge, the progression of the phenomena stopped. This all made sense in the end, since seizures and migraines start at opposite ends of the brain cells."

The team could use a positive charge in order to stop the spreading and end the episode in the rat brain.

"We came up with a biophysical understanding and it applies to the fundamental physiology of the aura, and we can make it worse with one current and we can make it better with the opposite current," said Schiff.

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Ideally, the team wants to apply this polarization to the human brain and test it in clinical trials with migraine sufferers. 

"One wants to be able to fix the brain so that it is not susceptible to migraines or seizures," said Bruce J. Gluckman, professor of engineering science and mechanics, neurosurgery and bioengineering and associate director of the Center for Neural Engineering. "Not to have to control migraines or spreading depression once it starts. For now, this is a fundamental result that moves us closer to being able to intervene in an important way for this condition."