Neuroscientists believe that future holds great promises for them to learn about the brain with the development of new technologies. With the advent of advanced scanning techniques, researchers have learnt to directly monitor a brain a work and determine the brain reaction to stimuli.

A new tool has been developed to expedite their work by crunching large data sets. Sheet microscopes enable researchers to make use of laser light to scan a sample of the brain of an immature zebra fish. Using the microscopes, researchers are able to record precisely when and how specific cells respond to stimuli.

Jeremy Freeman, Misha Ahrens, and other colleagues at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Janelia Research Campus have developed a set of tools called Thunder, which uses distributed computing to process the data. It is well capable of cutting short data-processing time of many days into hours or even minutes.

The details about the improvements made to data processing with the help of the new tools have been published in the July 27 issue of the journal Nature Methods.

According to the researchers, Thunder and distributed computing have paved a way for developing a full set of tools to examine large data sets. "The analyses we developed are building blocks. The development of new analyses for interpreting large-scale recording is an active field and goes hand-in-hand with the development of resources for large-scale computing and imaging. The algorithms in our paper are a starting point", said Ahrens in a statement.

By gaining insight into functioning of the brain and its response to stimuli, researchers will be able to create advancements in human intelligence, improved treatment for mental illness, learning disabilities and brain injuries.