Zoo Station

According to the Economist, Francis Crick attempted to unravel one of the great mysteries of life -- the nature of consciousness -- before he died last year. In a paper he published alongwith Christof Koch, Crick tries to explain the integrated nature of conscious sensation.

The part of the brain that caught the two researchers' interest is the claustrum, a thin sheet of grey matter that lies concealed beneath part of the cortex (the outer covering of the brain that carries out the computations involved in seeing, hearing and language).

The key to the researchers' claim is that most, if not all, regions of the cortex have two-way connections to the claustrum, as do the structures involved in emotion. It is plausible that the smell, the colour and the texture of the rose, all processed in different parts of the cortex, could be bound together into one cohesive, conscious experience by the claustrum. The authors liken it to a conductor who synchronises and co-ordinates various parts into a united whole.

Time will tell whether Crick's spectacular contribution to understanding genetics will be replicated in the sphere of consciousness.