Although it only occupies 2% of body mass, the human brain demands 15% of all the blood that circulates through our body. For several decades functional magnetic resonance imaging has been used as a non-invasive technique to track increases in blood flow in different areas of the brain, and thus discover which neurons are active during the development of certain tasks. Now a new study suggests that this technology can also show activity in areas necessary for what the brain thinks it will do next .
Aniruddha Das and Yevgeniy Sirotin of Columbia University in New York have used this "divinatory" method to analyze the brains of rhesus monkeys , according to the journal Nature . Specifically, the authors observed how the flow in the visual cortex of the monkey increased, even in situations of absolute darkness, when the animals waited for a visual task to begin. This indicates that increases in blood flow may occur in advance in areas of the brain that may need to be used in the near future, because imminent energy consumption is anticipated. Although sometimes, inevitably, the brain is also wrong.
