by From Will Dunham
Washington (Reuters) neuroscientists have produced the largest circuit diagram and the functional map of a brain of mammals, which used tissue from part of the brain raw of a mouse with eyesight, a performance that could offer insights into the work of the human brain.
You have had the brain architecture in a tissue sample in the size of a grain of sand with more than 200,000 cells, including about 84,000 nerve cells, called neurons, and about 524 million connections between these neurons to transitions, which are called synapses. Overall, they collected data that processes visual information out of sight in part of the brain that processes visual information about 3.4 miles (5.4 kilometers) of neuronal cables.
“The millions of synapses and hundreds of thousands of cells come in such a variety of shapes and sizes and contain massive complexity. If they look at their complexity, there is at least a feeling of awe about the mere complexity of our own heads,” said the neuroscientist Forrest Collman of all institutes for brain science.
The cerebral cortex is the outer layer of the brain, the main town of conscious perceptions, judgments as well as the planning and execution of movements.
“Scientists examine the structure and anatomy of the brain – including the morphology of different cell types and their connection – for over a century. At the same time, they characterized the function of neurons – for example, what information they process,” said neuroscientific Andreas Tolias by Baylor College of Medicine, one of the research leaders.
“However, it was difficult to understand how the neuronal function at circulation level was created, since we have to examine both functions and cabling in the same neurons. Our study is the greatest attempt to systematically combine the previous brain structure and function within a single mouse,” added Tolias.
While there are remarkable differences between the mouse and the human brain, many organizational principles are preserved across species.
Research focused on part of this region, which is called the primary visual cortex and is involved in the first stage of processing visual information by the brain.
Research was carried out by the micrometers, for Machine Intelligence from cortical networks, a scientific consortium in which more than 150 scientists from various institutions were involved.
The researchers at the Baylor College of Medicine created a map of neuronal activity in a cubic millimeter of the primary visual cortex by recording brain cell reactions, while the laboratory rose on a treadmill while looking at a variety of video images, including “The Matrix” films. The mouse had been genetically changed so that these cells emit a fluorescent substance when the neurons were active.
The same neurons were then depicted at all institutes. These images were compiled in three dimensions, and researchers from Princeton University used artificial intelligence and machine learning to reconstruct the neurons and their connection patterns.
The brain is populated by a network of cells, including neurons, which are activated by sensory stimuli such as visual or sound or touch and are connected by synapses. The cognitive function includes the interaction between the activation of neurons and the connections between the brain cells.
The researchers see practical advantages of this type of research.
“Firstly, the understanding of the wiring rules of brain can be informed about various neurological and psychiatric diseases, including autism and schizophrenia, which can result from subtle abnormalities. Secondly, to know exactly how neural cables enables brain function to uncover basic mechanisms of cognition,” said Tolias.
An important finding in research contained a map of how connections with a wide class of neurons in the brain, which are referred to as inhibitory cells, are organized. When these neurons become active, they do the cells with which they are less active. In contrast to excitatory cells, this is active with the cells that are associated with the probability. Inhibitory cells make up about 15% of cortical neurons.
“We found many other highly specific inhibitors to find than many, including us,” said Collman.
“Inhibitory cells not only combine with all the excitatory cells around them, but instead choose very specific types of neurons with which they can connect. In addition, it was known that there are four main types of inhibitory neurons in the cortex, but the patterns of specificity break down into much finer groups,” said Collman.
(Reporting according to Will Dunham, editing of Rosalba O’Brien)
