Intro to the Brain Visualizer
Welcome to the introduction to the brain visualizer tutorial! The brain visualizer allows you to: Visualize brain structures in 3D and view neuronal activities within them Create new brain structures and modify their properties Create cortical mappings to rewrite the brain The brain visualizer consists of two major workspaces, the 3D brain monitor and the circuit builder. In both of these environments, you will have access to tools enabling you to: Add or remove cortical areas Modify cortical properties Create connectivity rules and modify them You can immerse yourself in the 3D monitor or circuit builder environment or, you could select one of the slit view options to have visibility to both. We recommend you to operate in the split view mode to leverage the best of both environments. The brain visualizer provides means to adjust the sizing of user interface elements. You can also gain more insights about your artificial brain by expanding the health bar which provides information about the size of the brain and its health. Let's dive into the details
Intro to the Brain Visualizer
Welcome to the introduction to the brain visualizer tutorial! The brain visualizer allows you to: Visualize brain structures in 3D and view neuronal activities within them Create new brain structures and modify their properties Create cortical mappings to rewrite the brain The brain visualizer consists of two major workspaces, the 3D brain monitor and the circuit builder. In both of these environments, you will have access to tools enabling you to: Add or remove cortical areas Modify cortical properties Create connectivity rules and modify them You can immerse yourself in the 3D monitor or circuit builder environment or, you could select one of the slit view options to have visibility to both. We recommend you to operate in the split view mode to leverage the best of both environments. The brain visualizer provides means to adjust the sizing of user interface elements. You can also gain more insights about your artificial brain by expanding the health bar which provides information about the size of the brain and its health. Let's dive into the details
Adding a Cortical Area
The top left navigation bar below the neurorobotics studio options, allows you to: Add cortical areas Create connectivity rules Change the font Switch between the 3D monitor and circuit builder views Monitor brain health To add a cortical area, 1. Select a cortical area type 2. Select an input type 3. Edit cortical area details Refer to the input and output cortical areas tutorials for more details
Adding a Connectivity Rule
To add a connectivity rule, 1. Select a connectivity rule type 2. Edit the connectivity rule details 3. Define the vectors Refer to the Connectivity Rules Tutorial for more details
Adjusting Font Size
To increase or decrease the font size, Click the larger “A” to make the font size bigger Click the smaller “A” to make the font size smaller
Change Views
Neurorobotics Studio allows you to choose between 4 different views: Vertical split Brain Visualizer (BV) & Circuit Builder (CB) Horizontal split BV & CB BV CB
Monitor Experiment Health
To monitor your experiments health, you can: Edit how fast the brain processes information in hertz which is equivalent to number of refreshes in a second. View the number of neurons and synapses in your experiment Monitor the health of your experiment
Editing Cortical Areas
To edit one of your cortical areas 1. Click it (in BV or CB) 2. Select the magnifying glass. A toolbar should pop up with the options to: View cortical area details of its details, such as the neuron firing parameters, post synaptic potential parameters, connections, and danger zone. There will be a dedicated tutorial explaining all properties in detail. Connect a cortical area by selecting its source, destination, and connectivity rule. You can aopy a cortical area, as well a delete cortical area.
Circuit Builder
The circuit builder enables you to view the wiring diagram of the brain where you can interactively modify the wiring. You are able to visualize mapping webs between cortical structures and modify connections via dragging and dropping lines from the output to the input and vice versa. You can not connect input to input terminals or output to output Input Terminals Connections appear on the right Output Terminals Connections appear on the left Once the“edit mapping" box shows up, you can edit details, such as if it’s inhibitory versus excitatory behavior and plastic versus non plastic properties. Non-plastic connections will appear as white circles, while plastic will be yellow. As you can see in this example, your circuit can become very intricate
3D Brain Monitor
The 3D monitor view allows you to visualize the neurons firing in your custom brain. The blue boxes represent cortical areas that turn red when activated and. You can manually activate the neuron by holding shift and clicking that specific box, turning it green. The layout of your cortical areas make up the three-dimensional cortical structure of your custom brain. As you can see by the x, y, and z axes the brain, your cortical areas can range into different heights and lengths. This axis also serves to monitor if the brain's connectivity is on or off.
