Researchers borrow Facebook networking concepts for Alzheimer's study

Researchers borrow Facebook networking concepts for Alzheimer's study

New Alzheimer's research borrowed networking concepts from Facebook, according to Stanford University School of Medicine scientists. After analyzing the brains of people with the disease, researchers found that Alzheimer's patients' brains were less well-connected than the brains of people without the disorder. Using a concept known as small-world networking, in which informational hubs in the brain connect with each other, researchers studied the paths through which these hubs connected. Social networking sites work the same way, linking people who don't know each other through mutual friends. When researchers compared the path length and number of hubs between people with early-stage Alzheimer's disease and control subjects, they discovered that the people with Alzheimer's disease had fewer functional hubs. Researchers said it would be like two people finding each other on Facebook without the benefit of a mutual friend.