Brain of Patient H.M. Being Sliced, Streamed Live

buswolley writes "The slicing of the brain of the famous amnesic patient H.M. into giant histological sections is now in full swing, and is being streamed live. The brain specimen is frozen and sectioned whole during one continuous session that is expected to last approximately 30 hours."

Comments

HM

[serviscope_minor]

For those of you unaware, HM had essentially complete loss of long term memory, but a normal short term/working memory and, curiously the ability to commit long term learning to his motor memory. So, he could learn new motor skills (an example would be juggling, but I do not know if HM learned that particular task), but not high-level memories.

If you're interested in more, then try reading the excellent book: "The man who mistook his wife for his hat".

Re:HM

[johncadengo]

Yeah. That was exactly what I was wondering when I read this. A nice link to wikipedia would've been nice.

P.S. UC San Diego. Go Tritons!

Re:HM

[Jahava]

We can call it 1 / Memento.

Re:HM

[Anonymous Coward]

I am a neuroscientist, seriously don't read that book, its filled with of exaggeration and confabulation. Oliver Sacks writes well enough to entertain the un-informed but his work is more fiction than not.

There are so many better books out there for the layperson.

I recommend this book http://tinyurl.com/yjfo44p

Re:HM

[Digital Pizza]

The full link to the book is here:

http://www.amazon.com/Phantoms-Brain-Probing-Mysteries-Human/dp/0688172172/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1259799787&sr=8-1

Mirror

[NiteMair]

http://neurosciences.ucsd.edu/

Article

[qmaqdk]

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2009/12/02/slicing-up-h-m-s-famous-brain-live-and-on-the-internet/

Henry Gustav Molaison

[phizi0n]

I had to go through 3 links just to find the poor guy's name. http://www3.signonsandiego.com/news/2009/nov/30/hm-recollected-famous-amnesic-launches-bold-new-br/

Re:brain structures

[simcop2387]

about the normal brain structures? maybe none, BUT they might learn how his brain rewired itself, and get an idea of what areas of the brain weren't connected anymore to get a better idea of why he had no long term memory (and provide information about how the brain actually does that!), it at the very least might shed light on how the brain forms those connections

Re:Necessary?

[Pronkzilla]

I am a pathology resident who has done about ten autopsies and from my limited experience I can say that this practice is absolutely necessary. The reasoning behind sectioning the brain is to obtain tissue for histologic examination (i.e. under a microscope). This is done to correlate clinical or radiologic findings with actual disease processes. A simple example would be a case of a small brain hemorrhage, where the radiologist thinks he/she sees some bleeding in a certain area of the brain. On autopsy, we can slice up the brain, take sections to be processed and placed on a glass slide, and actually look at the brain microscopically to confirm that there was indeed hemorrhage in the area of brain suspected by the radiologist. Also, brain sectioning/microscopic evaluation can reveal lesions or abnormalities that are not visible to the radiologist (i.e. early Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, etc.)

Paraffin slices are very useful

[damn_registrars]

If they are making paraffin (yes as in wax) slices of the brain, it could lead to some very useful research. One research application in particular that has been of great value is tissue MALDI mass spectrometry. Essentially, from a wax section we can now evaluate protein expression across different cell types. When looking at unusual tissue, the ability to study differential protein expression is a fundamental technique to understanding what makes the tissue different.

So for those who are wondering what the application of this is, there are many.

Re:Not H. M.

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Anonymous Coward,

For the record, we don't like being told what to do.

Thank you,
The Moderators.