Hearing aid users know that just doubling the sensory input is a rudimentary fix. ItвЂ™s the logic behind the design of the first hearing aid вЂ“ if a personвЂ™s voice grows twice as loud, the ear should respond twice as much. Researchers tend to model the relationship as linear with a single variable, measuring the average size of a single brain regionвЂ™s response. Investigations into how excited brain regions match up with cognitive functions make another mistake when they rely on assumptions that lead to overly simple models. Here at the Global Center for Neurological Networks weвЂ™re focusing on how these wireless signals work in the brain to communicate information.

The intensity and structure of these fields depends on the activity of the nerve cell. As the ions flow in and out, electric fields are generated. The nodes of Ranvier allow charged ions to diffuse in and out of the neuron, propagating the electrical signal down the axon. These spots that lack the protective insulation that wraps the rest of the axon are called nodes of Ranvier. Along the way, wireless signals are naturally emitted from uninsulated portions of nerve cells. In the case of the brain, nerve cells conduct electrical impulses down long threadlike arms called axons from the cell body to other neurons. The overall system of information transfer works because of both wired and wireless connections.Д®lectric fields stem from charged particles flowing in and out of neurons at their uninsulated nodes of Ranvier. The router then sends the information to your laptop using wireless connections. The internet is delivered to a router via a wired connection. A very simple analogy of what is going on in the brain is how a wireless router works. My research team has worked for several years detailing the origins of these wireless connections and measuring their field strengths. Some connections are actually вЂњwireless.вЂќ These are electric near-field connections, and not the physical connections captured in tractographs. Anatomy alone вЂ“ the neurons and nerve fibers вЂ“ cannot explain the excitation of these regions, concurrently or in tandem.

PM Images/Stone via Getty Images Wireless hot spots in your headД¬ognitive functions such as reasoning and learning use a number of distinct brain regions in a time-sequenced manner.

Neuroscience has only a rudimentary understanding of how it all fits together.Д®lectric near-field connections provide another level of communication within the brain. And theyвЂ™re getting better at recording how information moves through the brain by using enhanced functional magnetic resonance imaging to measure blood flow.Д«ut in spite of these tools, no one seems much closer to figuring out how we really see. Researchers are getting better at mapping the brain using tractography вЂ“ a technique that visually represents nerve fiber routes using 3D modeling. It would seem that if scientists can map the nerve fibers and their connections and record the timing of the impulses that flow through them for a higher function such as vision, they should be able to solve the question of how one sees, for instance. The brainвЂ™s вЂњliving wiresвЂќ are connected in elaborate neurological networks that give rise to human beingsвЂ™ amazing abilities. Neuroscientists presume that itвЂ™s the brainвЂ™s anatomy вЂ“ with its hundreds of billions of nerve fibers вЂ“ that make all of these functions possible.

The brainвЂ™s jobs include interpreting touch, visual and sound inputs, as well as speech, reasoning, emotions, learning, fine control of movement and many others. Of these, one big piece is actually a conjecture: that thereвЂ™s a relationship between the physical structure of the brain and its functionality. How the brain works remains a puzzle with only a few pieces in place.

Hippocampus anatomy 2d