1 Brain, 100 Billion Neurons, 100 Trillion Connections

Brown Institute for Media Innovation, Center for Spatial Research with the Zuckerman Institute, Columbia University (USA)

Galata Greek Primary School

“Santiago Ramon y Cajal, around the turn of the last century, had used histological staining to find that neurons never touch but are proximate. Nerve impulses or action potentials jump from cell to cell… The brain is a communications network… Of course, so is the genome. But whereas the messages passed down through DNA and RNA seem to have the weight of destiny… the connectomic model of the human being is radically historical… The human brain has some 100 billion neurons and between them the network involves trillions of connections So at the heart of the ‘hardest’ science there is, these images start to show us that whatever it is we think we are — are we human? — we are certainly not static, and certainly not ‘natural,’ if nature is opposed to history.” –LK

This project by the Center for Spatial Research presents artifacts and novel forms of data visualizations produced in collaboration with the Brown Institute for Media Innovation and scientists from the Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute at Columbia University in New York. Exhibits presented include 3D models of neurons and the brain, interactive games developed based on MBBI experiments, and a collection of science artifacts and factoids to help contextualize the science behind them.