An unshaven young grad student raised  his hand tentatively.  "Dr. Martin, I have a question."  Meridith knew some tough questions may be coming.  "Yes, go ahead, and remind me of your names please. It may take me a few days to learn them all."   "Lewis Nicks" the student began.  "So we're going to be experimenting with brain cells in our heads?   Don't these cells have a function already?  I mean, are we sure this is safe?" 

Meridith was ready for this one.  "Very good question.  I'm sure you've all heard the saying that we only use ten percent of our brains.  Actually, that's not true.  CAT scans show that every part of our brains function under various circumstances, but in several different ways.  Roughly ten percent of our neurons are near the surface of the brain and form the neocortex.  That's the wrinkled ridges that you may be familiar with.  The neocortex neurons do have very specific functions, and form pathways that allow us to interpret and process sensory information.  As we go deeper below the surface though, the neurons act more in groups, delivering electrical charge to whatever section of the neocortex happens to be active at any given time.  In answer to your question, we'll be working with a small group of neurons just below the neocortex that are responsible for transmitting electrons for use.   There are many more neurons performing this same function, so there won't be any noticeable loss of brain function.  In real terms, there may be something like a microsecond delay in some small normal brain activity.  We have over a hundred billion neurons in our heads on average.  We'll be experimenting with less than one hundredth of one percent of those."

Meridith looked around the classroom.  That was a lot of information to throw at them at once.  Some of the students were thinking about what they had heard.  Others were calmly taking notes.  About what she had expected.  A small redheaded girl seated in the middle of the class had been quickly writing what looked to be very detailed notes.  She raised her hand suddenly, as if she had solved a riddle. 

"Yes, please go ahead" Meridith prompted.  "Nicole Meekes" she started, quietly but confidently.  "You said before that neurons act like a binary switches.  From the numbers you just gave us, we'll be using one hundredth of one percent of a hundred billion total neurons.  That many binary switches works out to about to about 116 megabytes.  Is that enough space to do any useful computing at all? 

Meridith was a little taken aback.  "Wow.  I didn't even see you using a calculator" she smiled.  "Actually, what I told you before about neurons and binary switches was just a rough analogy.  In reality, these cells are packed in a three dimensional grid.  Each neuron directly touches about twenty neighboring cells, forming an electrical connection with each one.  Instead of a simple on/off switch, each neuron is a twenty-way switch.  If we had the skill to program the required base twenty machine language, we'd be talking about the equivalent of about half a trillion terabytes.  Theoretically, we could beat hell out of every supercomputer on earth with just one cubic centimeter of your brain matter.

"Getting a little ahead of ourselves, no?"  Dr. Addams was a bear of a man standing in the doorway of the classroom.  He was holding a small metal cage containing a white rat in one hand, with a laptop computer under his other arm.

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