Australian scientists have discovered a new part of the human brain previously unknown. Greek Australian Neuroscientist George Paxinos and his team have uncovered the pea-sized region close o where the brain connects with the spinal cord.
Professor Paxinos, who has christened it Endorestiform Nucleus, says the newly discovered part had been waiting for him to find it he admited: "It wasn't that I was concentrating on finding this particular structure. But it was really more that the nucleus was staring at me, (more like) the nucleus found me than me (finding) it. We just never named ... never thought that that area was a different part of the brain. Now, I looked at it more closely, and I can say it is."
"It wasn't that I was concentrating on finding this particular structure. But it was really more that the nucleus was staring at me, the nucleus found me than me it.
The research team started to put together an atlas of the brain about an year ago, requiring the team to update all prior versions with any newly recorded discoveries. Fellow researcher Teri Furlong says large photographic prints of a sample brain were spread out in a large room for Professor Paxinos to trace the brain's neurons.
"You can't see a lot with your eye. You need a microscope. We scan the brain on this very expensive microscope and then create ... the sections are one millimetre apart, so they cut right through the brains in a cross-section. And then George prefers to work by printing those images out so that every image is quite large. Then you have all of them to kind of mess around with and rearrange to work your way through the brain."
George Paxinos Source: Supplied
Professor Paxinos says he suspected the existence of the newly found region 30 years ago but was reluctant to mention it. "In fact, in the publication in 1990, I drew a line around it. But I wasn't bold enough to state that, 'This is a different part of the brain, and here's its name.'"
Then, recently, he decided to go back to the suspicious spot and spend time studying it again. Professor Paxinos says the region is a unique area of the human brain and may not be present in other animals such as monkeys. He theorises it may be useful for controlling certain movements in the human body: "From its position, one could suspect that it might be involved in fine-motor control. The fact that it is present in the human but not in other animals, not even the monkey, that we have studied suggests that it might account for some of the fine-motor control that humans excel at."
Professor Paxinos and his team may have made the discovery, but the job is not finished. The researchers say mapping the region has made it possible for the wider research community to actually study it.
Dr Furlong says more extensive research could help identify its uniqueness. "I think taking another brain -- even looking at the literature, in case someone has accidentally identified it and not realised. But (see) if there's a unique protein that can be found there that's not found in surrounding regions. So make it stand out against its background, and make it different from the regions around it."
