It's a milestone. More than fifteen years after a similar discovery for male genitals, a team of German researchers has managed to discover exactly which area of the brain the clitoris is connected to. His study, published on December 20 in the scientific journal JNeurosci, shows the exact location of the area of the brain that is activated during the stimulation of the clitoris.

The work was done by stimulating the clitoris of 20 healthy women between the ages of 18 and 45, while having an MRI of the brain.

When a part of the body is touched, neuronal activity is triggered in the somatosensorial cortex. Each part of the body corresponds to a different area of the brain, forming a kind of body map. But so far, the precise location of the female genitals had been the subject of debate.

Previous studies sometimes placed it under the foot, sometimes near the hip. The latter study shows that, in the case of women, the representation of the genitals is actually close to the hip, as in the case of men.

Until now, the stimulation techniques that were not precise enough had the drawback of simultaneously touching other parts of the body or causing arousal, which confused the results of magnetic resonance.

This time, for stimulation, the scientific team specifically designed a small round object that is applied on the underwear in the clitoris, with jets of air and a small membrane that begins to vibrate slightly.

Measuring the impact of Genital Reparation techniques

This discovery represents a step forward in the knowledge of female pleasure, which was already delayed: until 1998 the exact anatomy of the clitoris was not known thanks to dissection, and then only in 2005 thanks to an MRI. And the complete anatomy was only correctly represented in a French book in 2017.

But above all, this progress could help develop better treatments in the future for people suffering from sexual disorders or for victims of sexual violence, especially genital mutations.

Professor Pierre Foldès, the first person in the world to have developed a technique for reconstructing the clitoris, considers this advance to be important. "thanks to its precision, this new tool will allow us to measure the impact of repair techniques," the surgeon explained to France 24. "A valuable tool, as these techniques are constantly evolving because genital mutilation and its complications vary from woman to woman," she adds.

The knowledge of the nervous circuits of the clitoris is the core of this doctor's work, which has helped more than 6,000 patients in thirty years, with the aim of "reconstituting a functional clitoris (with nerve connections) and not only aesthetic".

The discovery of the German research team will make it possible to measure scientifically the signs of pleasure emitted in the brain after repairing the mutilated female organ, "although it will be necessary to continue listening to the words of the patients", the professor stresses, who invites us not to forget the psychological accompaniment of any surgical work.

For this reason, she co-founded the Institute Women and safe girls a place of reception, listening and psychological, legal and social support in Saint-Germain-en Laye, in the suburbs of Paris, at the initiative of activist Frédérique Martz.

Late knowledge of female sexuality

"it's 2021, it's time to be interested in the specificities of female anatomy," said Fabienne el-Khoury, spokesperson for the association Osez le feminisme, contacted by France 24. "the study is only about 20 women, it's just the beginning. We'll have to expand the sample to find out more. "

"we tried to fill the lack of high-level knowledge about female sexuality," says Professor Foldès. Thirty years ago, this training urologist discovered the extent of genital mutilation while working for doctors of the World in war zones, especially in sub-Saharan Africa.

On his return, he realized that there was no precise cartography of the anatomy of the clitoris: "a page and a half was devoted to it, compared to the 10 pages of the penis. The surgeon then embarked on an investigation and discovered the" modern anatomy "of this female pleasure organ: a part of the clitoris surrounds the vagina. This revolution allowed him to repair removed clitoris, because one part remains intact in the vulva in most mutilations.

The identification of the cortical area of the clitoris is therefore an important step in recovering this delay. The authors of the study are well aware of this. "the way the female genitals are represented in the human somatosensorial cortex is completely underestimated," explains Christine Heim, professor of medical psychology at the Charité University Hospital in Berlin and co-author of the study. "and this lack of knowledge has hampered research on both standard sexual behavior and pathological conditions," he added.

Their hypothesis is that, in the case of people who have been sexually abused, this area may have been reduced as a kind of "brain response to limit the harmful effect of abuse". Thanks to their research, therapies to "train" this area may be envisaged.

With AFP