Brain of Albert Einstein
His apparent regularities or irregularities in the brain have been used to support various ideas about correlations in neuroanatomy with general or mathematical intelligence.
[10][11] In 2010, Harvey's heirs transferred all of his holdings constituting the remains of Einstein's brain to the National Museum of Health and Medicine.
"This unusual brain anatomy...[missing part of the Sylvian fissure]... may explain why Einstein thought the way he did," said Professor Sandra Witelson who led the research published in The Lancet.
"[17] In the 1980s, University of California, Berkeley professor Marian Diamond received four sections of the cortical association regions of the superior prefrontal and inferior parietal lobes in the right and left hemispheres of Albert Einstein's brain from Thomas Harvey.
"[21] Dr. Dahlia Zaidel of the University of California, Los Angeles, examined two slices of Albert Einstein's brain containing the hippocampus in 2001.
The neocortex is where detailed, logical, analytical and innovative thinking takes place, Zaidel noted in a prepared statement.
The findings show that Einstein had more extensive connections between certain parts of his cerebral hemispheres compared to both younger and older control group brains.
[25] A study, "The cerebral cortex of Albert Einstein: a description and preliminary analysis of unpublished photographs",[16] was published on November 16, 2012, in the journal Brain.
Dean Falk, an evolutionary anthropologist at Florida State University, led the study - which analyzed 14 recently discovered photographs - and described the brain: "Although the overall size and asymmetrical shape of Einstein's brain were normal, the prefrontal, somatosensory, primary motor, parietal, temporal and occipital cortices were extraordinary.
"[26] There was a fourth ridge (apart from the three normal people have) in Einstein's mid-frontal lobe involved in making plans and working memory.
The parietal lobes were markedly asymmetrical and a feature in Einstein's primary motor cortex may have been associated with his musical ability.
[citation needed] Neurologist Terence Hines of Pace University is strongly critical of the studies and has stated that they are flawed.
His brain was studied by Rudolf Wagner who found its weight to be 1,492 grams and the cerebral area equal to 219,588 square millimeters.
[30] Other brains that were removed and studied include those of Vladimir Lenin,[31] the mathematician Sofia Kovalevskaya,[32] and the Native American Ishi.
[33] Recent research on Einstein’s brain has revealed several unique anatomical features that may be linked to his extraordinary cognitive abilities.
Studies have found that certain regions of his brain, such as the prefrontal cortex and parietal lobes, were unusually well-developed and densely packed with neurons.
[34] The story of Harvey's theft of Einstein's brain and its subsequent study was explained in an episode of the Science Channel show Dark Matters: Twisted But True (a series which explores the darker side of scientific discovery and experimentation) that September 7, 2011.
