Michelangelo hid a second anatomically accurate painting of the human brain in the Sistine Chapel fresco, The Separation of Light from Darkness, says Dr. Rafael Tamargo, a professor of neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University.

“As we studied the lines that Michelangelo had included in the neck, we were surprised to find that if you follow these lines, you can actually draw an anatomically correct view of the brainstem. I showed it to other neurosurgeons, and without saying much, they spontaneously recognized the brainstem.”

The researchers (A), matched the the neck of God in Michelangelo’s fresco, with a similar area (B) in the brainstem of a cadaver, and then (C) identified all the specialized areas of the brainstem in the neck of God portrayed in Michelangelo’s painting. Copyright 2010, Congress of Neurological Surgeons