After an elderly patient died suddenly during a routine test, scientists accidentally captured unique data on the activity in his brain at the very end of his life: During the 30 seconds before and after the man's heart stopped, his brain waves were remarkably similar to those seen during dreaming, memory
People who have had near-death experiences have reported the phenomenon of replaying past memories. This is the first scientific evidence that this may be true. It is impossible to make further assumptions about how common the phenomenon may be or what the experience may be, as this is the only case study.
The discovery was made in 2016 while studying the brain activity of an 87-year-old Canadian man who had been diagnosed with scurvy. The team was performing anEEG to learn more about what was happening during his seizures. The man died of a heart attack. The team accidentally made the first-ever recording of a dying brain when the patient died.
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The researchers recorded around 900 seconds of brain activity before and after the patient died. They were able to see how his brain waves changed as he was dying. He had an unusual change in his brain wave activity after his heart stopped.
A senior researcher at the University of Toronto said that they saw changes in a specific band of neural oscillations just before and after the heart stopped working. Zemmar, who is now at the University of Louisville in Kentucky, said that these types of waves are known as gamma waves.
Neural oscillations are classified by their frequencies. When people access their memory center in a region called the hippocampus during dreams, they can see the highest frequencies of any wave in the brain.
The team gathered data on other types of waves during death. Life recall is a phenomenon in which the man replays memories from his life in his brain.
According to Zemmar, the brain may be playing a last recall of important life events just before we die.
Rats have been shown to experience the same levels of gamma oscillations around the time of death. The researchers theorize that life recall may be a universal experience shared by a majority of mammal brains.
It would be premature to say that life recall is a real phenomenon. The dying man was old and had a seizure. His brain activity could have been different if he had scurvy. There is no way to know if the man was actually seeing, or perceiving, his past memories or if he was just in a dream-like state brought on by his failing nervous system.
More research is needed to make conclusions about life recall. The report of the man's case was not published until six years after his death because the researchers were hoping to uncover more case studies of dying brains to support their claims.
Although our loved ones have their eyes closed and are ready to leave us to rest, the findings could provide a source of comfort to friends and family members.
The case report was published in February.
It was originally published on Live Science.
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