Understanding the intricate networks of animal brains has been a major challenge for scientists, especially when studying diseases such as Alzheimer’s. Traditional methods could have been faster and cheaper.
Before SmartEM, scientists used ordinary microscopes, but it took a long time to capture the details of the brain. SmartEM, developed by researchers at MIT and Harvard, combines powerful electron microscopes with artificial intelligence (ai). SmartEM learns about the brain while taking images. It acts as an assistant that helps to quickly examine and understand the tiny parts of the brain such as synapses and neurons.
SmartEM is not just a camera; It works intelligently, like our eyes when we look at things: focusing on what is essential. The researchers added a unique computer chip (GPU) to the microscope, allowing the ai to decide where to look closely. This helps the microscope spend more time on difficult areas, just as our eyes focus on essential details when looking at a face or reading a book.
To demonstrate its capabilities, SmartEM worked on octopus brain slices. He took images of these thin slices and reconstructed them into a detailed 3D map. This map helps scientists understand how different parts of the brain are connected, similar to discovering connections in a large group of friends. With SmartEM, a task that would have taken two weeks with typical methods now only takes 1.5 days.
The team behind SmartEM aims to make brain studies faster and more cost-effective. They hope that one day more scientists from different places can join brain research without requiring a huge budget. They also want to use SmartEM to study diseases by examining small details in patient brain samples. The goal is to quickly understand what is happening in the brain to perform more efficient hospital pathology studies.
In short, SmartEM is a powerful tool that combines electron microscopes with artificial intelligence to help scientists explore the mysteries of our brain more efficiently. With their help, researchers hope to discover secrets about how our brain works and find ways to combat diseases that affect it.
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Niharika is a Technical Consulting Intern at Marktechpost. She is a third-year student currently pursuing her B.tech degree at the Indian Institute of technology (IIT), Kharagpur. She is a very enthusiastic person with a keen interest in machine learning, data science and artificial intelligence and an avid reader of the latest developments in these fields.
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