In his 2022 book Zero to Birth, How the Human Brain is Built, developmental neurobiologist William Harris includes ice hockey analogies to describe how the body’s most complicated organ develops in the womb, drawing on a 40-year career studying fruit fly, salamander, frog and fish embryos.
Harris, professor emeritus at Cambridge University, UK, played the sport growing up in Canada and is now a coach. “A coach will have tryouts and select the best players for different positions,” he says. “The brain does the same thing. Maybe two neurons try out for every position, one makes it that’s a little bit better at communicating, and the other one doesn’t, going through a process called apoptosis. The survivors have to last your whole life.”
Harris highlights some differences between human and animal brains, (cerebral cortex size, for example, and how newborn babies are hard wired to understand and develop speech). Writing the book, he believes, made him respect human and animal brains even more. “Probably our brains are the most unique things about us. We have unique faces, but our brains are even more unique. You just can’t see them,” he says.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
A funder's guide to tackling setbacks and winning grants
Sexual harassment in science: tackling abusers, protecting targets, changing cultures
Bullying in academia: why it happens and how to stop it
Magical meeting: a collaboration to tackle child malnutrition in Bangladesh
How to deliver a safer research culture for LGBTQIA+ researchers
Trolled in science: “Hundreds of hateful comments in a single day”
Dodging snipers, fleeing war: displaced researchers share their stories
Science on a shoestring: the researchers paid $15 a month
Shielding science from politics: how Joe Biden’s research integrity drive is faring
Unlocking the mysteries of the brain’s neocortex
How to keep Ukraine’s research hopes alive
How trauma’s effects can pass from generation to generation
How deep brain stimulation is helping people with severe depression
Restoring the sense of smell to COVID-19 patients
Understanding the difference between the mind and the brain
The hospital conversation that set a young epilepsy patient on the neuroscience career path
The brain science collaboration that offers hope to blind people
Social sponges: Gendered brain development comes from society, not biology
What happens in our brains when we're trying to be funny
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Reaching your Goals
What It’s Like To Be...
Becoming You with Suzy Welch
The Cardone Zone
Let’s Talk Offline