Harvard researchers say that nerve fibers in the brain that
carry thoughts and control actions crisscross on a grid that
could one day be used to help diagnose mental disorders.
Researchers, who used a powerful new scanning tool to peer
inside the brain, upended a long-held assumption that the fibers
are jumbled, with no identifiable pattern, Bloomberg reported.
Instead, they found a hidden order within regions that include
the cerebrum and the brain stems, said a report Thursday in the
journal Science. The brain "is like Manhattan," said lead author
Van Wedeen, a radiology professor at Harvard Medical School in
Boston. "You have a grid of streets going left and right, and
you have elevators going up and down." He called the results "a
huge surprise." Read more and see a photo at Medical Xpress