Brain of Einstein
The death of physicist Albert Einstein 60 years ago marked the beginning of an exciting and strange journey to get the most important and great part of Einstein, his mind. Which was stored in a tractor and slides that still inspire awe and scientific research.
At 1:15 am on the 18th of April 1955, the theoretical physicist and the pacifist and the venerable genius feuded Einstein with some words in German before he died, but the nurse at Princeton Hospital at that moment did not speak German unfortunately. Thus, Einstein's last words were lost forever.
Later in the day, Einstein's body was burned in the city of Trenton, New Jersey. But the next day, Hans Albert, the son of Einstein, was surprised when he discovered that his father's body in the shroud was not completely perfect before the burning process. Where a front page article was published in the New York Times entitled "Removing the Brain That Placed Relative Theory and the Cause of Nuclear Fission Evolution"
Dr. Thomas Harvey, a pathologist who was in charge of a autopsy, did not simply determine the cause of death - just aortic blast - and only. But decided to open the skull of Einstein to take 'precious contents'.
Caroline Abraham interviewed Doctor Thomas Harvey during the search for her book "Possession of Genius: The Strange Story of Einstein's Brain." "Harvey had great professional ambitions for Einstein's brain," says Caroline. I think he was hoping to make a name for himself in the academic medical community in a way he could not have done before himself. He simply came to work one day to find the body of Albert Einstein at the top of his autopsy table. "
When Hans Albert learned of his father's brain accident, he became very angry and angry. His father was a very modest man. His body was burned without any ceremony. His father had asked him to spread the dust of his body in secret so that his grave would not become a sacred place for pilgrims.
But it seems that Einstein gave the impression to people at some point that he would be happy if his body was used in the service of science and scientific research. Thomas Harvey persuaded Hans Albert to give permission to study his father's brain in the hope of doing what the New York Times later called "shedding light on one of the greatest mysteries of nature: the mystery of genius."
Harvey dominated the brain amid controversy. "In fact, it was hard to tell whether Harvey had captured the brain for himself or the 'science' really, which put him in doubt," said journalist Michael Paterniti, who met Harvey near the end of his life. Neuroscience in any form, but promised to look for the best specialists in the country in this area to cooperate on studying the brain and publishing their results soon. Years later, no scientific research of Harvey about Einstein's brain appeared. After a while, the brain was completely forgotten.
But in 1978, the young journalist Steven Levai was sent by his editor to search for 'the famous lost member'. The brain was not at the Princeton Medical Center (as Princeton Hospital was called at the time), and Thomas Harvey was not there either. But Levai was able to track Harvey in Wichita, Kansas.
"I told him I was writing a story about Einstein's brain," Levai recalls. But first he said to me: 'I can not help you with this.' He did not seem interested in talking. "But in the end, Harvey agreed to meet the journalist at his office at the small medical lab in his workplace, and Liffay quickly found out that Harvey was still aspiring to publish his 'scientific paper' on the subject.
He added that Harvey was still convinced that he would carry out the study even though he had no convincing answers to why he did not publish anything after about 25 years.
When Levai insisted on seeing some pictures of Einstein's brain, a strange smile appeared on the doctor's face. Then he stood smiling, and walked behind Levai toward the factory corner and removed a small refrigerator from a set of paper boxes. And then pulled large glass containers and then was the surprise, Einstein's brain, how amazing his view.
In an article published in the New Jersey monthly magazine, Lefay described the contents of one of the bottles or glass containers: "It looked like a clamshell shell of oyster content, the color of the clay. It is hand-sized, gray in color and has a consistent and cohesive appearance like a sponge. "In a small bag there was a mass of pink white threads that were full of teeth." He continued: "In a larger glass vial, there were rectangular packets of transparent blocks the size of a chocolate bar."
Harvey then told him what he had been doing for the past 23 years. In 1955, Harvey photographed and photographed Einstein's brain, armed with the permission of Hans Albert to investigate and study his father's brain. He also ordered the brain to be drawn by an artist who had already painted his children.
Thomas Harvey did not act alone in those early early days, but was assisted by the executor of Einstein's autobiography Neethin, with his friend and neurologist Harry Zimerman.
Harvey supervised the process of dividing the brain into 240 blocks, and then formed 12 sets of 200 slices containing the samples of ordered and cluster-sorted membranes. The samples were then delivered as Harvey promised to the best neuroscientists of the 1950s.
But Harvey did not hear the response of these few scientists. Those who responded to him did not find anything different in the brain than any ordinary brain of 'non-intelligent brains'. The scientists' findings reflected what Harvey had already achieved when he weighed Einstein's brain for the first time. He found it within 1230 grams, which is considered to be the lowest normal range for men of Einstein's age.
While Harvey was sending small samples of Einstein's brain with enthusiasm around the United States, he kept most of it. The US military was among the many people who tried to reach the brain. As Abraham says, "They felt that the acquisition of the brain might put them in the ranks of the Russians, who were gathering their 'own brains' at that time." Brain synthesis seems to have been common at that time. But retaining the brain led to a series of painful events for Harvey.
Caroline Abraham adds: "It was supposed to be like luck, but in fact it was an old curse. Harvey lost almost all of his brain possession. He lost his job, his marriage, and his career in Princeton as well. After all the disagreements that have emerged around him, he has not regained his position in the hospital. "Of course, this explains his presence in Wichita when Levai met him for the interview.
After the article appeared in the summer of 1978, Harvey became a center of media attention and became the focus of attention. The Science Journal interviewed him and the journalists' army in his garden. Of course, many have tried to ask for samples, including human anatomy specialist Marianne Diamond at the University of California at Brockley. Finally, the era of Einstein's brain study began with the expulsion sent by Thomas Harvey to Diamond, consisting of four brain-sized pieces of sugar cube in the Mayonnaise Craft jar.
What did these studies tell us, which tried to study Einstein's brain and the nature of genius?
In 1985, Diamond published a scientific paper in the Experimental Neuroscience Journal, in which one of the four brain samples contained more glial cells for each neuron or neuron than a group of brains studied. Glial cells are known by their Greek name 'gum' - because they play the role of connecting and stabilizing nerve cells in their places and providing them with oxygen and food. In a previous research in mice, Diamond found that the stimulating environment may increase the number of glial cells. Perhaps the low proportion of nerve cells in the brain of Einstein's brain cells refers to the kind of life he lived, a life devoted to the greatest and greatest scientific mysteries and 'hasty'? Other research and studies were carried out
In 1996, Brett Anderson of the University of Alabama in Birmingham published a study on the frontal cortex of the brain of Einstein. He found that the number of neurons almost equivalent to the number of cells in the brain group studied, but the cells were closer and closer together, and may allow faster and better processing of information in the brain.
In another Lancet medical paper published in 1999 by Sandra Witelson of McMaster University in Canada, she studied the original Harvey photos of Einstein's brain. According to Sandra, the lower parietal lobule of Einstein's brain was larger than normal and seemed to be better united, the region responsible for spatial knowledge and mathematical thinking. According to Witelson's prediction, the shape of Einstein's brain may be related to Einstein's thinking. "Words seem to play little, but there is interplay