Scientists turn to art, create breathtaking visualizations of brain scans

Neuroscientist Greg Dunn, PhD, and applied physicist Brian Edwards, PhD, have teamed up to create an artistic series of brain images using a technique called reflective microetching. The two describe the work as “the most fundamental self-portrait ever created."

The scientists took two years to complete the images of 500,000 neurons by blowing up a thin slice of the brain 22 times. The new technique, called reflective microetching, microscopically manipulates the reflectivity of the brain’s surface. The pair hand painted and digitized various regions of the brain and later used a computer program to show the complex choreography of the mind as it processes information.

My Modern Met shows the collection of illustrations the duo created called "Self Reflected," which was made to “remind us that the most marvelous machine in the known universe is at the core of our being and is the root of our shared humanity.”

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