A connectome is a comprehensive description of the network elements and connections that form the brain (Sporns et al., 2005).
Clear and comprehensive knowledge of anatomical connections in the brain lies at the basis of understanding brain functions. In the connectome featured on this website, the three-dimensional organization of the projection patterns between and within the hippocampal formation, the parahippocampal region and the retrosplenial cortex are visualized in an interactive connectome. All reported projections concerning this system for the rat were collected and stored in a database and visualized in an interactive pdf document.
The second version of our interactive connectome is now freely available for download. This pdf document displays almost 2600 connections in the rat hippocampal – parahippocampal - retrosplenial region, which can all be interactively switched on and off. In addition, two papers are available.
- In the first paper, we highlighted the underexposed aspects of the anatomy of the hippocampal formation and parahippocampal region, together with some of the functional implications of these underexposed connections (van Strien, Cappaert, Witter, 2009).
- In the second paper, we added the retrosplenial cortex to the connectome and discuss the challenges and advantages of connectomes (Sugar et al, 2011).
