Postdoctoral researcher Chris Harris points the cursor at vesicles, the tiny black bubbles carrying neurotransmitters between brain cells. “Are the cell walls distinct? Can I see synaptic vesicles? Can I see myelin?” “What I’m looking at is the quality of the tissue,” Harris says. “And just outside of that is the cell body membrane itself.” He points out the mitochondria, the individual axons, which send nerve impulses from one neuron to the next the branching dendrites, which receive signals and thick black dots that represent synaptic vesicles - pouches that hold neurotransmitters, or brain chemicals. “This layer is the nuclear membrane,” he says. He traces the outer edge of one of the cells with a gloved finger. As he zooms in, the eyes become even larger and then disappear altogether, replaced by a glimpse of what lies within and behind them in its brain: a jungle of axons and dendrites and cell bodies - all the stuff that makes up individual neurons. On the screen, it looks grumpy, like it’s frowning.Ĭhris Harris, a postdoctoral researcher at the lab, is scrolling through the image. The zebrafish is a larva, a newborn, just one week old, and barely six millimeters long. In a small, windowless room that houses two powerful electron microscopes, a scientist is searching for the perfect fish brain.Īs the massive machines hum nearby, two gigantic fish eyes loom large, taking up most of a computer screen. Scientists at the NIH are mapping the activity of thousands of individual neurons inside the brain of a zebrafish as the animal hunts for food.
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