Math Neurons In The Brain

 

They finally did it.  They located the neurons in the brain that do the math.  That is so exciting. Research shows that certain neurons fire when a person is performing  certain mathematical operations.  Specifically, some neurons fired when the problems involved addition and others fired when subtraction was being done. 

The researchers used data obtained by the physicians at the Department of Epileptology in Bonn.  They specialize in performing surgical procedures on the brains of people with epilepsy.  They discovered that epileptic seizures originate from the same area when they implanted probes in the brain.  These probes were used to determine the place where the spasms originated.  At the same time, they were able to measure the activity of individual neurons.

The electrodes were planted in the temporal lobe of the brain so they could record the activity of the neurons. The researchers had these people do simple arithmetic problems.  The results indicated that certain neurons fired during addition and others fired during subtraction. To determine if the brain was reacting to the plus and minus signs, researchers replaced the signs with the words and the brains reacted the same way. This indicates the neurons actually encode instructions for the mathematical operation. In addition, they found the activity displayed by the brain showed quite accurately which operation it was performing as people did the problems. 

The researchers set up the program by instructing a self learning computer as to whether the activity indicated the brain was doing addition or subtraction to train it.  Then they ran new data through the program to see how well it learned and the program was able to accurately determine the correct operation being performed.  Furthermore, they discovered that cells in the parahippocampal cortex also fired during addition and subtraction.  It appears the cells used dynamic coding in regard to the carrying out the operations.

There has been limited research done on which parts of the brain is actually used when solving mathematical problems.  This will help scientists when they conduct research on the brain as they look for more data.  Up to now, they believed the brain consisted of billions of neurons capable of carrying out different functions but this is the first time that neurons have been identified as "math" neurons. 

This opens so many doors for future research.  It is cool they've identified how the brain handles addition and subtraction.  Let me know what you think, I'd love to hear.  Have a great day.