Ever feel like your brain is at full capacity, pushing out old memories to make room for new ones?
In reality, the brain has an astonishing ability to store vast amounts of information without ever needing to delete anything.
Scientists have now developed a model that explains exactly how we continue to form new memories while preserving old ones—sometimes for an entire lifetime.
A Breakthrough in Understanding Memory Storage
Researchers at Columbia University have created a mathematical model that could revolutionize our understanding of memory.
Their findings suggest that molecular clusters in the brain work together to create a nearly limitless storage system.
“The model that we have developed finally explains why the biology and chemistry underlying memory are so complex—and how this complexity drives the brain’s ability to remember,” says Stefano Fusi, a principal investigator at Columbia University Medical Centre.
Until now, scientists thought memory was stored by adjusting the strength of synapses, the connections between neurons.
This was often visualized as a series of dials that could be turned up or down to strengthen or weaken a memory.
However, this model had a critical flaw—dials have limits. If the brain operated this way, it would eventually run out of space.
A Radical Shift in How We Think About Memory
The traditional model assumed that synapses could only adjust within a limited range.
Even an updated theory from 2005, which proposed that each synapse contained multiple dials, couldn’t fully explain the brain’s incredible memory capacity.
Clearly, something was missing.
Now, Fusi and his team have challenged this assumption.
Their research suggests that synapses are not static, isolated units.
Instead, they operate as a network of interconnected components, constantly communicating with one another.
“Once we added the communication between components to our model, the storage capacity increased by an enormous factor, becoming far more representative of what is achieved inside the living brain,” explains Marcus Benna, one of the researchers on the team.
How Your Brain Balances Memory Storage
To visualize this new model, imagine a series of beakers connected by tubes.
As liquid flows into or out of a beaker, the tubes distribute it evenly among the others, preventing any single one from overflowing.
This system allows the brain to store new memories efficiently without losing old ones.
This breakthrough provides a new understanding of why the brain doesn’t run out of space despite constantly taking in new information.
With approximately 86 billion neurons, researchers estimate that the brain’s memory capacity could be around a petabyte of data—though comparing it to computer memory isn’t entirely fair, as human memory operates far more dynamically.
Implications for AI and Neuromorphic Computing
The impact of this discovery extends beyond human memory.
Neuromorphic hardware, a type of artificial intelligence designed to mimic brain function, has long struggled with memory limitations.
Most current AI models require vast amounts of storage but lack the adaptability of human memory.
“Today, neuromorphic hardware is limited by memory capacity, which can be catastrophically low when these systems are designed to learn autonomously,” says Fusi.
By applying the new beaker model of synaptic communication, researchers believe they can create AI systems that learn more efficiently, requiring less energy and processing power while retaining more information—just like the human brain.
Your Brain’s Infinite Potential
This new understanding of memory challenges previous assumptions about the brain’s capacity.
Instead of being a simple storage device with limited space, it functions as a highly sophisticated network that dynamically balances new and old information.
So next time you worry about forgetting something important, remember: your brain is designed for infinite learning.
And thanks to ongoing research, we might soon be able to create computers that think just like us.
