If you thought the brain and central nervous system are complicated, then consider its development. New researchshows that the creation of a single nerve cell, or neuron, involves the precursor cell severing itself from the embryo’s neural tube. The neuronal precursors do not merely separate and withdraw. Instead, they are attached to the tube by long tentacles which constrict and then break off. This allows the precursor cell to move to where it needs to be without taking with it the machinery for constructing a new neuron. It is a very detailed and complicated choreography that just got more complicated. Read more