IIT Madras’s Sudha Gopalakrishnan Brain Centre has produced the world’s first cellular‑resolution atlas of 100 human brains, covering prenatal to 85‑year‑old stages, after a ceremony led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi last month.
The team froze each donated brain, sliced it into 10‑20‑micron sections—roughly a tenth of a human hair—and imaged every cut to stitch a 3‑D model. An adult brain yields 8,000‑10,000 sections, while a foetal brain requires about 3,000.
Professor Mohanashankar Sivaprakasam says the atlas will help clinicians spot developmental anomalies and guide neurosurgeons, mirroring how cardiac mapping transformed heart surgery.
The project brings together 200 researchers across life sciences, engineering, AI, and more, and partners with 10 hospitals, including CMC Vellore, KMC, and Saveetha, to translate maps into clinical tools.
All 100 atlases will be released to the public in the coming weeks, allowing researchers worldwide to build on a cellular‑level reference that could accelerate drug discovery for neuro‑degenerative diseases.