Electrical synapses in the brain offer new avenue for epilepsy research and possible treatment

A child with absence epilepsy may be in the middle of doing something--she could be dancing, studying, talking--when all of a sudden she stares off into space for a few moments. Then, as quickly as she drifted off, the child snaps back into whatever she was doing, unaware that the episode occurred. That brief moment of disconnect from reality is called an absence seizure. Researchers now suggest that electrical signals directly exchanged between brain cells may hold promise as a potential target...