Below we present to you 20 short facts about the human brain that you may not have known.
1. Although responsible for only about 2% of body weight, the brain consumes about 20% of the oxygen in our blood and 25% of the glucose (sugar) circulating in the bloodstream.
2. There are about 100 billion neurons in the brain, but they make up only 10% of the brain. About 75% of the brain is water.
3. The average weight of the human brain is about 1.3 kilograms.
4. The brain produces a current strong enough to power a 10 to 23 V light bulb.
5. The average adult brain weighs about 1.3-1.4 kg. Height and weight have nothing to do with intelligence quotient (IQ).
6. When the blood supply to the brain is interrupted, after losing consciousness after 8-10 seconds, he can survive without oxygen for only a few minutes because brain cells begin to die after 1 minute without oxygen.
7. A newborn baby’s brain triples in size in the first year of life.
8. The brain has 60% white and 40% gray matter.
9. When you have a headache, your brain doesn’t hurt. The brain has no pain receptors and therefore cannot even feel pain.
10. Although some animals have larger brains, for example the elephant, the human brain accounts for 2% of the total body weight (in the case of an elephant, it is only 0.15%), which means that humans have the largest brain for their body size.
11. Many studies have proven that the brain can easily create a false memory, that is, create an event in your childhood that never actually happened.
12. Laughing activates five different parts of the brain.
13. If it’s healthy, your brain never loses its ability to learn.
14. Research has shown that the hippocampus, the part that deals with visual-spatial awareness, is larger in London taxi drivers than in other people. London taxi drivers spend months and sometimes years memorizing literally every street in London before they get their license.
15. There are certain ‘mirror neurons’ in the brain that cause you to yawn when others yawn around you, but also cause a part of your body to hurt for a moment, even though someone else has hit themselves. Scientists believe that these neurons are also responsible for the general feeling of empathy towards others.
16. Drugs like cocaine activate the pleasure center in the brain (nucleus accumbens), and release dopamine serotonin which makes you happy. The nucleus accumbens is also activated when you help someone in need or donate money/goods to a charity.
17. Every time you remember something or have a new thought, you create a new connection in the brain.
18. There are over 100,000 kilometers of blood vessels in the brain.
19. Numerous scientific studies have concluded that reading aloud to children and talking to them often contributes significantly to the development of their brains.
20. If you want to remember something, create an association because that’s how memory is created.
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