Brain Blueprints: Constructing Our Mind

Your brain weighs a couple of kilos and contains about 100 billion cells communicating with each other through trillions of connections, more than the number of known stars in the galaxy. The main components of this vast biological machine with awesome computing power were made from a single cell that is barely visible, the fertilized egg, in a few months before birth. How was it done? Tonight, we will explore what we know about this process, and how differences in how it plays out create differences between all of our brains.

Our brains, the seat of who we are and our ability to learn and adapt to the world around us, orchestrate a symphony of complex functions critical for our everyday activities and cognitive processes. To facilitate the tasks carried out by the brain, its smallest functional units require immense numbers of proteins to be continuously made to store information in the form of memories. Our brains are large, complex structures with trillions of individual connections- which presents a unique logistical challenge: how do you get proteins where they need to be when they need to be there? Our brains solve this logistical challenge by adopting an IKEA-like approach for distributing resources across their trillions of connections. Rather than just transporting entirely assembled products from a centralised source, it transports the materials and blueprints needed to make many of these products at the required site, which, in this case, are proteins. In this talk, we will embark on a journey into the intricacies of how the brain controls when and where proteins are made, its implications for the brain's fundamental functions, and how a breakdown in protein production contributes to neurological disorders. Join us as we delve into the fascinating world where neurons receive signals and craft their molecular toolkit to shape our thoughts, memories, and behaviours.