for a while i was scared i was researching two parallel subjects: neural structure and biomedical psychiatry. but then i realized i need to know how the brain works to understand what the drugs do to it. Like, anti-depressents block the reuptake of serotonin. I wouldnt have understood reuptake at al if i didnt know about synapses... which are really cool. If you do the same synaptic process enough, these molecules start making random proteins and changing the whole structure of the receiver neutron. And THAT'S how you remember stuff, maybe. so how did that guy lose all his short-term memory? maybe something blocked the molecules from making proteins. It's cool, all the connections.
It also amazes me what they forgot to tell us about the brain in 6th grade science. I hd thought the brain was completely neurons... glial cells outnumber them 50 to 1! they do almost everything neurons do, and other stuff that keeps neurons working.
Also, they used to think neurons couldnt repair themselves, or make new ones, but now they can, and it'll change everything. of course, they found this out in 1999, so i need to find an up-to-date article, but this means our brain isnt a one-strike deal. and seeing what we do to our brains, drug-wise, that's not a bad thing... supposed medical drugs can hurt, too. side-effects, anyone?
speaking of drugs, cocaine makes you schizophrenic. seriously. they think schizoprenia is when you have too much dopamine, and cocaine blocks the process that gets rid of dopamine once it's done its job... so it does it over and over.