White brain matter
From Bioinformatikpedia
White Matter
The central nervous system an be divided into two components:
- white matter
- grey matter
The white matter is formed by glial cells and myelinated axons whereat myelin itself makes up the majority of the white matter. Myelin is produced by glial cells and is composed of water, lipids and proteins. It forms layers called myelin sheaths around axons and functions as a dialectric material for speeding up signal transduction.
In contrast, grey matter includes neuronal cell bodies and unmyelinated axons.
As you can see in figure (
) white and grey matter can easily be distuinguished in brains conserved in formaldehyde
