Human Brain with No Wrinkles?

A brain with no wrinkles or folds was discovered by Adam Voorhes in a closet with human brains stored away at the University of Texas. Voorhes spent over a year trying to find out more about this brain and the other 100 human brains in the collection that have been subsequently preserved in jars of formaldehyde for more than 20 years, forgotten. All of these rediscovered brains are considered disfigured or abnormal in some way, but the brain with so few folds and grooves is very rare. Though he spent over a year trying to find out more about it, nothing about the specific brain has come up.

This article caught my attention because it almost sounds like a mystery novel of sorts. It’s very interesting how basically nothing is known about this brain that was found along with several others in a closet forgotten about for so many years. Who was the one that stored so many human brains in the closet 20 years ago and why did people forget about it? Was the human brain collection something that has being collected in secret? And where did all the brains come from and why are they all not “normal” brains? There are so many questions that this article rises. 20 years ago, this person, or persons that were collecting these brains, why didn’t they bring these human brains to light and to the public to figure out how there can be a brain that doesn’t have an wrinkles? What in the world could have caused a brain not to have any wrinkles?

In class we talked briefly about Lissencephaly, which means smooth brain, a lack of sulci and gyri, and how it is a very rare and gene-linked brain malformation. An article that was referenced in this article talks about how most children with this diseases die before they are 10-years-old but the brain that was found with no wrinkles is the brain of an adult! It is extremely confusing how such a rare brain would be found in a closet and how there is nothing known on how this brain came to be and why it wasn’t brought to public attention sooner.

Source:

http://www.iflscience.com/brain/lost-and-found-smooth-human-brain