Talk:Human brain#We should add the brain turned to glass at Heruclaneum

I've updated the "three" in "The cerebrum, brainstem, cerebellum, and spinal cord are covered by three membranes called meninges" to "four" using this ref from the below item recently featured in 2023 in science:

Scientists report the discovery of an unknown thin membrane meningeal layer in brain anatomy, the SLYM, that likely plays a role in CSF functions and is both {{tooltip|a protective barrier and hosting immune cells|it appears to be substantially involved in major brain diseases and brain aging}} that monitor the brain for infection and inflammation.{{cite news |last1=Charuchandra |first1=Sukanya |title=Scientists discover a new protective layer in the brain |url=https://www.advancedsciencenews.com/scientists-discover-a-new-protective-layer-in-the-brain/ |access-date=15 February 2023 |work=Advanced Science News |date=30 January 2023 |archive-date=30 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230130084439/https://www.advancedsciencenews.com/scientists-discover-a-new-protective-layer-in-the-brain/ |url-status=live }}{{cite journal |title=A mesothelium divides the subarachnoid space into functional compartments |journal=Science |year=2023 |volume=379 |doi=10.1126/science.adc8810 |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/366903551 |last1=Møllgård |first1=Kjeld |last2=Beinlich |first2=Felix R. M. |last3=Kusk |first3=Peter |last4=Miyakoshi |first4=Leo M. |last5=Delle |first5=Christine |last6=Plá |first6=Virginia |last7=Hauglund |first7=Natalie L. |last8=Esmail |first8=Tina |last9=Rasmussen |first9=Martin K. |last10=Gomolka |first10=Ryszard S. |last11=Mori |first11=Yuki |last12=Nedergaard |first12=Maiken |issue=6627 |pages=84–88 |pmid=36603070 |bibcode=2023Sci...379...84M |s2cid=255440992 }}

• University press release: {{cite news |title=Newly discovered anatomy shields and monitors brain |url=https://medicalxpress.com/news/2023-01-newly-anatomy-shields-brain.html |access-date=15 February 2023 |work=University of Rochester Medical Center via medicalxpress.com |language=en |archive-date=7 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230107034340/https://medicalxpress.com/news/2023-01-newly-anatomy-shields-brain.html |url-status=live }}

I hope that's okay. There may be more places to add info on/from this study, possibly including in this article and at Cerebrospinal fluid (e.g. in #Regulation). Moreover, it may be good if info on this in Meninges was more detailed or overhauled.

However, somebody else should make any further due updates and quite likely this should wait until there is a review on this(?) If so, please revisit this issue once a review is out; if brief info is due before, please add it.

{{reflist-talk}} Prototyperspective (talk) 22:01, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

I just added a sentence "Brain structures that are not on the midplane exist in pairs, so there are for example two hippocampi and two amygdalae." Could someone put in some more information on this point? Which organs exist as a pair, and which do not? Also, apparently some parts are single, but symmetrical, such as the thalamus. Eric Kvaalen (talk) 17:12, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

:It's really more a matter of bilateral symmetry than of pairing. Regions of the cortex are not functionally symmetrical, either. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:42, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

This essay is a chapter in a book, not a journal article. I don't know how to fix the citation style. LovelyOliveGreen (talk) 20:56, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-025-88894-5?ref=404media.co

Giordano, Guido et al. “Unique formation of organic glass from a human brain in the Vesuvius eruption of 79 CE.” Scientific Reports.

Nearly 2,000 years ago, a young man aged about 20 was chilling out in the Collegium Augustalium, a hall built to worship Emperor Augustus, in the Roman town of Herculaneum. Nobody knows what was running through his mind that morning, but we know what was there by the afternoon: A heat-shocked brain preserved in organic glass.

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This unlucky fellow was one of the thousands of people killed when Mount Vesuvius blew its ever-lovin’ top in the year 79, burying the neighboring towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum in searing ash, lava, and pumice.

The man in the Collegium Augustalium, who probably served as the building’s guardian, was lying down in bed when he was hit by a fast-moving volcanic belch, known as a pyroclastic flow, which raised his body temperature well above 510°C (950°F).

That is, medically speaking, too hot. But while it is an absolutely horrifying way to die, the guardian has the posthumous honor of having a preserved glass brain “formed by a unique process of vitrification” which “is the only such occurrence on Earth,” according to researchers led by Guido Giordano of Università Roma Tre.

“Our comprehensive chemical and physical characterization of the material sampled from the skull of a human body buried at Herculaneum by the 79 CE eruption of Mount Vesuvius shows compelling evidence that these are human brain remains, composed of organic glass formed at high temperatures, a process of preservation never previously documented for human or animal tissue, neither brain nor any other kind,” said the team.

“The glass that formed as a result of such a unique process attained a perfect state of preservation of the brain and its microstructures” including “exceptionally well-preserved complex networks of neurons, axons, and other neural structures,” the researchers added.' Doug Weller talk 16:26, 1 March 2025 (UTC)

:{{done}}: [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Human_brain&diff=1278358345&oldid=1272324592]. Thanks, Doug, for pointing this out! --Tryptofish (talk) 00:08, 2 March 2025 (UTC)

::And thank you for doing the edit. I was just too tired. Doug Weller talk 12:19, 2 March 2025 (UTC)