Scientists mapped every neuron of an adult animal’s brain for the first time ever

Sighs
*opens the comment section*

This is a fruit fly brain. For context it is about 42 times more complex than the average reditors brain. So this is a pretty good achievement.

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Scientists mapped every neuron of an adult animal’s brain for the first time ever:

It includes all ~50 million connections between nearly 140,000 neurons.

The map was created of the brain of an adult animal: the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. This remarkable achievement documents nearly 140,000 neurons and 50 million connections, creating an intricate map of the fly’s brain.

Published in Nature, the research marks a significant step forward in understanding how brains process information, drive behavior, and store memories.

The adult fruit fly brain presents an ideal model for studying neural systems. While its brain is far smaller and less complex than that of humans, it exhibits many similarities, including neuron-to-neuron connections and neurotransmitter usage.

For example, both fly and human brains use dopamine for reward learning and share architectural motifs in circuits for vision and navigation. This makes the fruit fly a powerful tool for exploring the universal principles of brain function. Using advanced telomere-to-telomere (T2T) sequencing, researchers identified over 8,000 cell types in the fly brain, highlighting the diversity of neural architecture even in a relatively small system.

The implications of this work are vast. By comparing the fly brain’s connectivity to other species, researchers hope to uncover the shared « rules » that govern neural wiring across the animal kingdom. This map also serves as a baseline for future experiments, allowing scientists to study how experiences, such as learning or social interaction, alter neural circuits. While human brains are exponentially larger and more complex, this research provides a crucial foundation for understanding the fundamental organization of all brains. As lead researcher Philipp Schlegel explains, “Any brain that we can truly understand helps us to understand all brain

Image: FlyWire.ai; Rendering by Philipp Schlegel (University of Cambridge/MRC LMB)

Cerebrussy

Not my proudest..

it’s a fruit fly. be afraid, be very afraid.

Why is there a Chameleon on top?

The silly shape makes sense when you consider this is the head of a fruit fly. The two weird things on the sides are the compound eyes, and at the top are the ocelli. The hole in the middle is probably where the digestive tract starts.

Neurussy

Looks like a dog taking a dump on a sex doll covered in candy sprinkles..

Try finger, but hole

Animal is from *Alderaan*