The Brain of the Century
James Adams

"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Albert Einstein

The face of Albert Einstein, Time magazine's "Person of the Century," captured
in
so many photographs, has become synonymous with the idea of genius. Many
consider him to be the greatest scientist that ever lived. His contributions
changed our conceptions of space, time, and the very nature of reality, and his
ideas have left their mark on nearly every aspect of modern physics, from the
subatomic to the cosmological.

Even now, 45 years after his death, scientists are trying to coax Einstein's
brain into providing even more information. The genius that was locked in the
tissue inside the Nobel Prize winners head may be able to teach us more about
the nature of intelligence, as neuroscientists try to discover what made this
most extraordinary of brains unique.

Genius in a Jar
At Einstein's request, his body was cremated after his death in 1955, at the age
of 76.
However, Dr. Thomas Harvey, the pathologist who performed the autopsy, pilfered
and preserved the famous physicist's gray matter without the consent of the
family.  With the brain in hand, the pathologist made a deal with Einstein's
oldest son, Hans Albert, and the Einstein estate, allowing Harvey to keep the
brain on the condition that it was to be used only for scientific study.

Harvey made some general measurements and took photographs of the whole brain
and the dissected hemispheres, and then cut the hemispheres into 240 pieces and
stored them for further study (Lancet 1999; 353: 2149-2153). He did not,
however, publish any of his findings.

The brain was not heard from again until 1978 when Stephen Levy, a young
reporter from the New Jersey Monthly, tracked it down to Harvey's office in
Wichita, Kansas.  According to Levy, now a technology columnist for Newsweek,
Einstein's brain was being stored in Harvey's office inside two Mason jars in a
cardboard box that once contained bottles of cider
(www.echonyc.com/~steven/einstein.html). Dr. Harvey's preliminary examinations
had found nothing unusual about the anatomical structure of Einstein's brain.

Harvey did give some samples of the brain to a few neuroscientists to study. One
of the scientists was Marian Diamond, a well-known Berkeley professor. She and
her colleagues reported that Einstein's brain appeared to have a higher
percentage of glial cells, the cells that nourish and support the network of
neurons (Experimental Neurology 1985; 88: 198-204).

However, Diamond and her colleagues only looked at a very small area of
Einstein's brain, making it difficult to draw accurate conclusions. Also, the
normal brains used for comparison were on average 12 years younger than
Einstein's at the time of death--the differences, if real, could be due to age
instead of genius.

Another paper was published in 1996, by Britt Anderson of the University of
Alabama, along with Thomas Harvey (Neuroscience Letters 1996; 210: 161-164). The
study reported that Einstein's brain actually weighed considerably less than
average--only 1,230 grams opposed to the 1,400 grams of an average adult male
brain. Apparently, bigger does not equal brighter.

The authors also reported that Einstein's cerebral cortex was thinner than that
of five control brains but had a higher density of neurons. Whether or not this
has anything to do with his intellectual abilities is pure speculation at this
point-it remains to be seen if a higher density of neurons is also found in the
brains of other highly intelligent people.

A Mind for Math
"Einstein's own description of his scientific thinking was that 'words do not
seem to play any role', but there is 'associative play' of 'more or less clear
images' of a 'visual and muscular type," writes Sandra Witelson, the latest
researcher to take up the study of Einstein's brain (Lancet 1999; 353: 2149-
2153).

Einstein often said himself that one of the keys to his genius was in his
ability to visualize the problems he was working on and then translate those
visual images into the abstract language of mathematics. In fact, one of the
most famous examples is his special theory of relativity, which, as the story
goes, he developed out of daydreams of what it would be like to ride through the
universe on a beam of light.

When Dr. Witelson and her colleagues at McMaster University in Ontario, Canada,
looked at the overall anatomy of Einstein's brain, they found some potentially
interesting anomalies in the parietal lobes, a part of the brain known to be
involved in processing mathematical thought, spatial visualization, and imagery
of movement.

Was Einstein's Genius in his Parietal Lobes?
Witelson and her colleagues compared the anatomy of Einstein's brain to the
brains of 35 men and 56 women, all known to be of normal intelligence. Of the 35
male brains, eight were an average of 68 years old--closer to Einstein's age at
the time he died than the brains used in earlier studies.

Overall, the researchers found that measurements of Einstein's brain fell within
normal ranges except for two interesting observations. The physicist's brain was
15% wider than the normal controls due to increased size of the parietal lobes,
and one of the grooves, called a sulcus, that normally separates two parts of
this region was largely absent.

"Einstein's exceptional intellect [in mathematical reasoning and spatial
visualization] and his self-described mode of scientific thinking may be related
to the atypical anatomy in his inferior parietal lobules," writes Witelson in
the paper, which was published in the June 19th, 1999 issue of the Lancet. She
and her colleagues suggest that the absence of the groove may have allowed the
neurons to make more interconnections than usual, possibly allowing information
to be shared more easily, contributing to Einstein's ability to intuitively
translate his insights into mathematical language.

While the results are intriguing and consistent with current theories of brain
function, they are far from conclusive. The major problem stems from the fact
that, in all the studies mentioned above, there is only one "experimental"
brain-Albert Einstein's. It's quite possible that the differences seen in his
brain structure are not related to his genius at all. It will be necessary to
examine the brains of other mathematical geniuses, and see if they also
share the same anatomical abnormalities. If so, then the parietal lobes may
indeed have been the seat of Einstein's abilities.

Looking at the brains of living geniuses may be easier than it was with
Einstein. In the past, a person's brain anatomy could be studied only after his
or her death, but modern technology, such magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and
positron emission tomography (PET), allows scientists to observe the brain at
work within the living body.  With this technology, it may prove quite possible
to observe, not only differences in brain structure, but also the actual amount
of activity taking place in those structures. For instance, if Einstein's brain
had been studied with this technology, scientists could have observed the
larger, unique parietal lobes and looked for activity in those areas as the
physicist thought about his theories.

In conclusion
There is no way to know how Einstein himself would feel about the studies being
conducted on his brain, but it's likely that he would understand our curiosity.
He once said, "I want to know God's thoughts; the rest are details." Perhaps the
neuroscientists studying the structure of the great physicist's brain are
looking for something similar: to know the thoughts of a genius, or at least, to
get some idea of how he was able to have those unique insights that
revolutionized physics in the last century.