Physical Sciences Division A Better Look at the Brain Imaging
expert describes tools developed to understand nervous system
The challenge of Dr. Mark Ellisman's life is understanding how
the brain works. He wants to know how the interplay of
structural, chemical, and electrical signals in and between
cells of nervous tissue gives rise to behavior. To meet this
challenge, he and his colleagues at the University of
California, San Diego, develop methods to understand the entire
brain, studying it from the whole atoms up to the whole
structure. An innovative tool they've built is the Whole Brain
Catalog, which is similar to Google Earth, allowing scientists
to see the details and the bigger view. "The Whole Brain Catalog
is an open source, downloadable, virtual catalog of the mouse
brain—from the whole brain to the molecular level," said
Ellisman, a Professor of Neurosciences at UCSD. A self-described
"recovering molecular biophysicist," Ellisman gave a polished
presentation about the latest tools for studying t