Image by azizul hadi via FlickrThe interconnection of Neurons also known as nerve cells creates a massively parallel computer that is responsible for processing all our sensory data. It also holds information in memory cells for later recall.It is convenient to compare the neural processing of information in the brain to the information processing in a computing device. However, the two of these devices process information in a very different manner. The computer is good at crunching numbers and working with the binary representation of the symbols. The computer can hold massive amount of information on storage devices. Human brain is not very good either at storing vast amount of information or doing quick number crunching. Its main strenght lies in being an excellent pattern recognizer. It can recognize things even if the presented with incomplete information. This observation has lead to the development of an area in computing also known as Neural Computing in which approximate model of neural network are simulated on a computer.
This short video shows a beautiful animation of neurons in the brain. How they are connected and how they function.
Brain Facts
The adult human brain weighs about 3 pounds (1,300-1,400 g).
The adult human brain is about 2% of the total body weight.
The average human brain is 140 mm wide.
The average human brain is 167 mm long.
The average human brain is 93 mm high.
The human brain has about 100,000,000,000 (100 billion) neurons.
The total surface area of the cerebral cortex is about 2500 sq. cm (~2.5 ft2)
Neurons multiply at a rate 250,000 neurons/minute during early pregnancy.
The weight of an adult human cerebellum is 150 g.
There are 12 pairs of cranial nerves.There are 31 pairs of spinal nerves.
There are about 13,500,00 neurons in the human spinal cord.
The total number of human olfactory receptor cells is about 40 million.There are 1,000 to 10,000 synapses for a "typical" neuron.The cell bodies of neurons vary in diameter from 4 microns (granule cell) to 100 microns (motor neuron in cord).
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