What’s on : Lectures

“Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation – reaching the parts other stimulators cannot reach”

Lectures
Date
27 Feb 2018
Start time
7:30 PM
Venue
Tempest Anderson Hall
Speaker
Professor Anthony Barker, Medical School, University of Sheffield
"Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation -  reaching the parts other stimulators cannot reach"

Event Information

“Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation – reaching the parts other stimulators cannot reach”
Professor Anthony Barker, Medical School, University of Sheffield

The first practical demonstration of Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) took place in February 1985 following a ten year blue-skies research project carried out in Sheffield, UK. Since then it has become adopted worldwide for many applications including basic research, diagnosis and for therapy in a range of disorders. Over eleven thousand papers have been published about, or using, the technique over the past three decades.

This talk will describe the origins of modern TMS and the legacy it owes to Michael Faraday’s discovery of electromagnetic induction. It will consider some of the currently available technologies and their clinical applications. Finally, it will speculate as to how TMS might become more effective in the future, both in terms of its technology and its therapeutic benefits.

Image: Electric fields induced in the motor cortex by transcranial magnetic stimulation.

Members report

Although electricity can be used to stimulate nerves in the body by placing electrodes on the skin, much of the current is blocked by tissues, particularly the skull if current is applied to the scalp. Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation uses Faraday’s principle of magnetic induction to overcome this problem – pulses of current passing through an external coil induce current flow within the body. Professor Barker entertained the audience by demonstrating the effect on a YPS volunteer, whose hands moved without his control, and then using the magnetic effect to project (somewhat explosively) an aluminium disc towards the roof of the hall. The technique has a much more serious use in the treatment of a number of psychological and neurological conditions, including depression and migraine. Research is still needed to understand exactly what is happening in the body, and to refine the technique and extend its use.

Margaret Leonard