SNAPSHOT: Fruit Fly Brain Captured With New 3-D Imaging Tech

(Credit: Courtesy of the researchers) The brain of a fruit fly is captured here using a new, large-scale 3-D imaging technique developed by a multi-institutional group of researchers led by MIT and Harvard University. The method is shockingly fast, and millions of synapses can be analyzed in just a few days. That's much faster than previously possible. The technique makes use of expanding brain tissue and what’s called lattice light-sheet microscopy. Here, the fruit fly brain is about the size of a poppy seed and contains around 10,000 neurons identifiable using the 3-D map. This allows scientists to trace neuronal pathways and explore the most minute connections between them, mapping the brain in incredible detail. Details of the technique were published earlier this month in the journal Science.