BRAINnet ~ media releases

Scientists and doctors in Sydney are working on a new way of unravelling the mysteries of the brain, based on the ability of superconductors to detect extremely weak magnetic fields. 

They are using a biomagnetometer - a research tool incorporating a conventional low-temperature superconductor - to make "contour maps" of the body's magnetic fields. 

The fields come from nerve cells carrying tiny electrical currents, part of the brain's biological signalling system. 

Doctors already measure these currents using electrodes on the skin, and record them on electroencephalograms (EEGs) and, in the case of heart nerves, on electrocardiograms (ECGs). But the signals are distorted by tissue and bone before they reach the skin surface. 

And, with an average brain containing about 10,000,000,000 nerve cells, some with up to 10,000 interconnections, an EEG can do little more than measure the roar of the crowd, according to Dr Evian Gordon, a senior lecturer in psychiatry at Sydney University. 

Dr Gordon leads a brain function research team at Westmead Hospital, which is working in collaboration with Mr Graeme Sloggett and others at the CSIRO's National Measurement Laboratories, at Lindfield. 

Since magnetic fields are not affected by tissue and bone, the researchers are developing a new instrument linked to computers which should map magnetic fields in the brain and heart. 

They believe they will then be able to pinpoint the source of any abnormal nervous activity, providing medical science with a useful new diagnostic tool.

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