This is very cool.

For the Brain, Remembering Is Like Reliving

Scientists have for the first time recorded individual brain cells in the act of summoning a spontaneous memory, revealing not only where a remembered experience is registered but also, in part, how the brain is able to recreate it.

For those of you that still doubt that the brain will open up its mysteries to us I need to ask you just one question:  When was the last time in the history of mankind that we have been able to listen to individual neurons and accurately determine the cause of their firing?

Though it did not address this longer-term process, the new study suggests that at least some of the neurons that fire when a distant memory comes to mind are those that were most active back when it happened, however long ago that was.