The circuit sensed when the specially treated brain slices were firing spasmodically in a way that mimicked an epileptic seizure, and then shut the seizure off by applying weak electric fields to the slices.
Complaints from Louis Vuitton, a luxury-goods firm, for example, led to nearly 9,500 seizures of knock-offs last year, 31% more than in 2008.
This requires a period of ten years without seizures while off medications.
You would think that media commentators would welcome the Special Forces and FBI's neat -- and casualty-free -- seizure of Ahmed Abu Khatalla off Tripoli's streets and onto a U.S. Navy ship and then a plane bound for an American courtroom.
"But can you do that to just a few neurons and trigger the same thing?" Says W. Allen Hauser, professor of neurology at Columbia University: "Anything that would give you clues to things that would turn off seizures readily could be applicable for a lot of things.
After that point, if there are no seizures, patients can taper off the medicine.
It is a little-understood disease, dating back years, that stunts growth, causes mental retardation and sets off sudden seizures.
More specifically, he added that electrical stimulation of nerves outside the brain was known to ward off epileptic seizures in some cases.
Medication, paid for by Medicaid, has helped Keyanna Rice cope, but the seizures can be set off by stress or lack of sleep, she said.
A little bit higher, near the left clavicle, you notice a bump beneath the skin marking the implantation site of her vagus-nerve stimulator, which delivers an electrical impulse to her brain every three minutes to stave off the seizures that would otherwise plague her.
