Mind
Your brain’s unexpected ability to regenerate and how to harness it
The controversial discovery that our brains can generate new neurons surprisingly late in life is now prompting a rethink of adult brain health, pointing the way to better treatments for stroke, dementia and depression
26 October 2026
For seven years, molecular biologist Ionut Dumitru and his colleagues played what felt like the world’s most exhausting game of hide-and-seek.
Yet instead of peeking around doors or under beds, they were examining brain tissue in a lab at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, looking for something that had long evaded neuroscientists: concrete proof that the adult brain can form new neurons via a process called neurogenesis. Scientists have spent decades debating whether this is possible. As soon as one paper turned up positive clues, another would yield nothing at all.
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But it seems the search may finally be over. A slew of new findings, including those from Dumitru and his team, have revealed near-certain evidence that adult neurogenesis occurs in the human hippocampus, part of the brain central to learning and memory. The discovery is forcing us to rethink long-held assumptions about our most indispensable organ, from how it functions to how it changes with age.
Even more exciting is the potential neurogenesis holds for brain regeneration. Some of our most devastating medical conditions, including Alzheimer’s, stroke and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), involve neurons dying at massive scale. If the brain is capable of replacing some of those lost neurons, we may be able to harness and enhance that ability, stimulating neurogenesis to help treat neurological conditions that are currently incurable.
“To many of us, we think the question is no longer whether it exists or not,” says neuroscientist Hongjun Song at the University of Pennsylvania. “It’s, how can we take advantage of that?”
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