A decade in the making, a new brain atlas has been unveiled recently at UCLA. Researchers are trying to better understand what constitutes a "normal" brain by studying a newly compiled atlas that contains digitally mapped images of 7,000 brains. This atlas is freely available to registered users over the Internet.
In addition to mapping the brain in multiple dimensions, it also charts brain activity, with the goal of pinpointing the seat of functions such as speech, memory, emotion and language and highlighting how those locations can vary among individuals and populations. The sources of the brain images are individuals living in seven nations on four continents. Most are between the ages of 20 and 40, but some are as young as 7 and as old as 90.
In addition to normal brain images, there are those of people with Alzheimer's, autism, schizophrenia and other disorders. It is a work in progress as it is continually updated. All of the images have been manipulated to fit a standard reference so researchers can easily perform comparisons.
Part of the research goals of the project states that "we are currently focusing on the study of human cerebral white matter tracts, cerebral vasculature, chemoanatomy, and connectivity in the human brain using fMRI-transcranial magnetic stimulation-PET. We also have expanded our neuroinformatics tools for data sharing and have created a "Conforming Site System" that allows laboratories worldwide to contribute data to our evolving atlas.
UCLA Laboratory of NeuroImaging
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