by Gyorgy Buzsaki
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Product Description
Studies of mechanisms in the brain that allow complicated things to happen in a coordinated fashion have produced some of the most spectacular discoveries in neuroscience. This book provides eloquent support for the idea that spontaneous neuron activity, far from being mere noise, is actually the source of our cognitive abilities. It takes a fresh look at the co-evolution of structure and function in the mammalian brain, illustrating how self-emerged oscillatory timing is the brains fundamental organizer of neuronal information. The small world-like connectivity of the cerebral cortex allows for global computation on multiple spatial and temporal scales. The perpetual interactions among the multiple network oscillators keep cortical systems in a highly sensitive metastable state and provide energy-efficient synchronizing mechanisms via weak links.
In a sequence of cycles, Gyorgy Buzsaki guides the reader from the physics of oscillations through neuronal assembly organization to complex cognitive processing and memory storage. His clear, fluid writing accessible to any reader with some scientific knowledge is supplemented by extensive footnotes and references that make it just as gratifying and instructive a read for the specialist. The coherent view of a single author who has been at the forefront of research in this exciting field, this volume is essential reading for anyone interested in our rapidly evolving understanding of the brain.
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Average Customer Review:
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
If you have not read it, for our own brain health, just do!, 2008-08-15
Really hard to find something like it (Nunez, Eccles and Shepherd work is some how on that level), and almost impossible to find a better one. A classic neuroscience work!
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
 Complete book, 2008-07-15
Nearly every brain oscillation is discussed, and importantly, the descriptions are very detailed, ad aided by numerous footnotes and useful references. I recommend this book to anyone interested in brain waves, their interactions, functions and their possible origins.
Also a word of warning: despite, or perhaps because of the completeness of the text, the book may not be very reader-friendly in some places: Full understanding of new theories or topics may require additional reading of the references, chiefly in chapter 11 and 12. Also, everyone I know who read this book took a pretty long time reading it through. In a way, it is not so much an explanation as it is a reference book.
If you have not read other books dealing with this subject, I recommend reading 'A Universe Of Consciousness' by Edelman and Tononi, first.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
Like the brain itself, 2008-05-16
The Buzsaki book on brain rhythms is a marvellous tour of neuroscience from the cellular through the behavioural to the wisely hypothetical. The concepts are presented in loops and cycles, with deep foot-notes, analogous to the brain mechanisms Buzsaki so clearly and entertainingly describes. Again, modelling brain processes themselves, Buzsaki has interacted with colleagues from many disciplines outside biology to emerge with succinct accounts of neural mechanisms.
Particularly enjoyable in this content-packed book, is that Buzsaki incorporates historical gems to acknowledge the origins of many of the fundamental ideas.
In the course of a few months, this book has become my most thumbed and dog-eared neuroscience reference.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
Brain functon, not just structure, 2008-01-11
This makes an excellent complement to Christof Koch's The Quest for Consciousness: A Neurobiological Approach. Koch's book is oriented to structure and hierarchical wiring, while Buzsaki's book is devoted to what goes through those wires- the large-scale firing and oscillations whose meaning is still mostly unclear, but whose persistence and complexity have captivated researchers for well over a hundred years. Which is more successful at illuminating consciousness? Buzsaki, by a mile! I found Koch's book somewhat disappointing, since after a huge build up of pretty well-known visual system anatomy and processing, his treatment of consciousness amounts to a brief bit of hand-waving. Buzsaki, on the other hand, while he does not make grand claims to even deal with consciousness, illuminates more of the temporal integration that is going on in the brain, and which will be absolutely central to plumbing this question. He also leaves the reader with extremely penetrating observations about consciousness- as a whole-brain phenomenon (or at least a whole-cortex), that it must be continuously graded with the size of brains, and that it is deeply connected with timing- with an approximate simultaneity of experience and integrated signal processing.
All that said, it is important to note that while Buzsaki is capable of excellent writing, such as in the introductory cycles (chapters), he routinely loses sight of the reader when presenting his own work and fields he is close to (in the middle and later cycles). The reader has to plow through mountains of unintroduced anatomy, private thoughts that seem never to have met an editor, and woefully under-enlarged and under-annotated illustrations. One wants to give him the benefit of the doubt that he is not covering up a lack of understanding, but the text can be trying at times, at least for the non-specialist. I would encourage work on a second edition where typos and illustrations are fixed, where all anatomy mentioned in the text is illustrated and described, and where substantial parts of the later cycles are re-written- expanded where there is substance, or cut where speculations and caveats outstrip the material.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
The beat goes on!, 2007-04-13
"Rhythms of the Brain" by Gyorgy Buzsaki is a brilliant introduction to neuronal oscillations and fundamentals of brain functions. An enjoyable and useful read for both lay reader and accustomed professional.
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