Whole human brain mapped in 3D

For proof that Wikipedia is more accurate than other encyclopedias, check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reliability_of_Wikipedia

(Though seriously, Wikipedia is about as accurate as the Encyclopedia Brittanica, at least for science articles: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v438/n7070/full/438900a...)

I scrolled to the bottom. The page had no sources. Then I went to the main English wikipedia page to get some sources, but apparently it completely disagrees with the simple English page.

The real megabyte page says that it has multiple meanings, and the mebibyte page says that "it was designed to replace the megabyte" and that "it is not commonly used". And I'll assume the sources listed are suitable for the moment.

Not a neuroscientist, but used to work in the field, and my first idea was "well by cutting it up, they also cut all connections". And those connections are far more important for understanding how the brain works than seeing where an individual neuron is physically located. Unless off course they can somehow get the connections out of it.

It seems like each brain is unique and it is meaningful to speak only about "connections" between regions and areas, given that even structure of nerves are different from person to person.

And, of course, it isn't even near to what we could call a "working model". Just a mapping of every neuron of some particular brain specimen. No one understands how it works yet. There are detailed description in textbooks of how each kind of cells in the brain works, but still can't see the mind among neurons.))

Shameless plug: 3Scan [1], a company spun off from a university in Arizona (if I'm not mistaken) and partially funded by Peter Thiel's Breakout Labs grant is making a robot that is capable of doing this entire procedure with absolutely minimal human involvement.

They can already do a full 3d map of blood vessels and neurons (with stains) in a mouse brain within a few days and store it on a TB hard drive (I'm told an equivalent for the human brain would be a petabyte but their slices might be thinner). This is a procedure that would take months if not years to do by hand (they do a full analysis on all of the slices to reproduce a 3d model afterwards).

This paper was done mostly by hand but soon we'll be able to do it quickly and automatically.

[1] http://www.3scan.com/