[2025.03.14]

GIMBC associate professor, Niall W. Duncan, recently published a paper entitled “Magnetic resonance spectroscopy and the menstrual cycle: A multi-centre assessment of menstrual cycle effects on GABA & GSH”.

The menstrual cycle involves changes in different chemicals in the body that tell different organs to change what they are doing. This is thought to include the brain, where there is some evidence that brain activity changes at different stages of the menstrual cycle. One effect that the menstrual cycle was thought to have in the brain was to change the amount of a neurotransmitter called GABA in it. This meant that people who were using a tool called magnetic resonance spectroscopy to study GABA in the living human brain would exclude women from their studies. Was this necessary though? Niall collaborated in an international effort to get the data that would allow them to answer this question.

Forty participants at 17 different research sites were scanned at different points in their menstrual cycle. GABA in different parts of their brains was then estimated from these scans and compared between the different cycle stages. What we found was that GABA levels did not in fact change when using this particular technique. This provides evidence that women should be included in spectroscopy studies investigating GABA in the brain. 

To read the paper, click this link: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165027025000718?via%3Dihub