In "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind", Jim Carrey’s character sets forth to wipe the memories of his ex girlfriend out of his mind citing that they are too painful to keep. Through this experience he slowly realizes that taking out the bad and painful parts also wipes out the good parts as well. Inevitably everyone at one time thinks “this is just too painful, wish there was a way to get over this faster”. Well what about a pill that may actually remove bad memories from the mind? What sounds like a science fiction late night movie, may actually be science fact.
Erasing Bad Memories Study
The study is from Merel Kindt and his coworkers in the University of Amsterdam. This Netherlands University is working with sixty subjects in a study that focuses on training people to fear and loathe spiders. They receive a shock each time they see a spider in a type of training to associate spiders to this fear response. After this training was completed they were then given either a placebo drug or a known beta-blocker drug called propanolol. Those receiving the drug propanolol were said to have a greatly reduced fear after just 24 hours. They also saw that the fear response seemed to be gone, making the scientists believe that the fear response was removed or erased. The study was written up in the Nature Neuroscience journal.
The Drug Propanolol
Propanolol is a beta blocker drug that is given for hypertension. It works by blocking the actions of epinephrine. In addition to prescribing the drug for hypertension, many off label uses for the drug include glaucoma, tension and cluster headaches, for heart attacks (myocardial infarction), tremor, as a experimental treatment for PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), and angina. It should not be given to diabetics, to those with Raynauld’s Syndrome, hypoglycemia, or those on drugs with bradycardiac effects.
The drug Propanolol will interact with some other drugs. Significant interactions will be seen with the drugs Verapamil, Epinephrine, Clonidine, Isoprenaline, Quinidine, NSAIDS, Phenobarbital, Lidocaine, Fluvoxamine, or Cimetidine. This is a short list of drugs as they are the ones that are most given, there are others that will need to be checked if you are on Propanolol.
Fear Factor Gene
In 2005 there was a “fear factor gene” seen. This gene is said to help put people into categories of those that fear much, and those that fear none. It was 2008 when the “glue that makes bad memories stick” was seen. This was a protein called beta-catenin, the protein that helps keep memories for the long term and not short term.
For now the drug is still being tested in trials on its ability to “unstick” bad memories from the brain. The ethics behind the drug in this setting is creating a firestorm of comments throughout the internet and on countless panels. Given the choice, would one keep their memories as learning experiences, or would one wipe it clean and start again?
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