"Neuroscientists around the world can now download these extremely accurate anatomical templates and use them to map other data, such as which parts of the brain are metabolically active and where particular genes are expressed," said project leader Helene Benveniste, a researcher in Brookhaven's medical department and a professor of anesthesiology at Stony Brook University.

The database was created using high-resolution magnetic resonance microscopy at the University of Florida in collaboration with researchers from Brookhaven's Center for Translational Neuroimaging. The work was done in parallel with the Mouse Phenome Database project, which aims to establish a collection of baseline phenotypic data from commonly used inbred mice.

The new brain-atlas database consists of 3-D anatomical data from 10 adult male mice of the strain C57BL/6J. It contains data on 20 segmented structures and downloadable visualization tools.

Groves of academe

Robotic simulated patients are allowing students in the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine to practice clinical skills before they treat human patients.