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New imagery shows brain neurons are arranged in 2D sheets (medicalxpress.com)
62 points by obtu on March 30, 2012 | hide | past | favorite | 8 comments



Does anyone know what they mean by a "grid"? Different neurons can have different numbers of connections and they connect all over the place, not just to their immediate neighbors.

I read and reread the first page of this paper and I can't figure out what they're saying. What's new here?


I'm no domain expert, but I think by talking about individual neurons your comment is focused a bit too spatially small. The pathways described in the paper involve numerous axons hooking up widely separated neuron sets.

I.e. for a computer analogy, this isn't showing the scale of internal wiring for a chip, or even cables on the scale of hooking the motherboard to a hdd. It is showing the wiring on the scale of 'from one rack in a sever room to another across the room'. Or, for a highway analogy, not the housing subdivisions, more the freeways.

I just got answered over on reddit by someone who did a thesis on tractography; they seem to be open to more questions: http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/rl1y7/diffusion_spe...


The article hasn't been liberated yet, but here's the abstract: https://www.sciencemag.org/content/335/6076/1628.abstract

A bit more on diffusion imaging, though you'll have to hit google scholar to find more up-to-date information on the signal processing:

http://www.metafilter.com/114373/What-a-beautiful-mind-you-h...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion_MRI

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tractography


Supplemental data at http://www.sciencemag.org/content/suppl/2012/03/28/335.6076....

I haven't completely read it, but that data looks more noisy than that medical express link. That makes me trust it more. I (did?) wonder whether Science would do April fool's jokes, or whether the authors made a deal to do so, with the article itself being real.


So all this time Cray has been doing it right:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cray-3_processor_brick.jpg


So it's true what they say about the fabric of the mind. Consider mine blown!


Sounds like what this guy was talking about a little. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48r-IeYOvG4


Intelligent Design




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