Tuesday, July 24, 2018

Nanoscale images of the entire fruit-fly brain!

This is huge.

Researchers can now trace the path of any one neuron to any other neuron throughout the whole brain, says neuroscientist Davi Bock, a group leader at Janelia who reported the work along with his colleagues on July 19 in the journal Cell.
"The entire fly brain has never been imaged before at this resolution that lets you see connections between neurons," he says. That detail is key for mapping out the brain's circuitry — the precise webs of neuronal connections that underpin specific fly behaviors.
They took over 7,000 slices of the brain, and made 21 million electron microscope images of the slices, allowing them to trace each neuron and synapse in the brain. This is nothing less than a nanoscale 3D model of the fruit fly brain, made slice by slice.

Suck it, David Suzuki. ~:D

The Phantom

Update: Welcome Instapunditeers! This brain did not belong to Ms. Ocassio-Cortez, but if it had, it might have been the right size to fit in her solid bone cranium.

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