For Louis-Jan Pilaz, days spent with tools and wood began as simple home improvement projects. He soon found himself learning how to whittle scraps of wood. Then, as a neurobiologist, Pilaz noticed a striking parallel. “It made so much sense to use wood to render neurons…They look like trees, and they have this flow of energy that is just like in neurons.” Inspired, he began to shape wood into intricate neural forms, transforming casual whittling into science-inspired woodworking art.
Louis-Jan Pilaz carves out the morphology of cells in the brain. This sculpture titled, “Cajal’s Purkinje Neuron” took him more than 26 hours to complete.
Louis-Jan Pilaz
When he first shared his artwork on X (then Twitter), the response was positive, and people expressed their interest in his work. Encouraged by his graduate student, Pilaz opened an Etsy shop in 2021 to sell his wood sculptures, and NeuroWoodworks was born.
Pilaz’s group at Sanford Research studies the development and dysfunction of the cerebral cortex and makes extensive use of microscopy, which fuels his research and serves as a source of inspiration for his wood art. “I’ve been obsessed with cell morphology since my PhD,” Pilaz said. “I experimented, just like I do in the lab, with the tools I have and tried to make [different cell] shapes.” He uses different types of wood, such as walnut and padauk, to create a variety of cell types and structures from Purkinje cells and radial glia to mitochondria.
One of his most memorable commissions came from a pediatric neurology hospital, which requested animal sculptures. Pilaz created a bear, a hummingbird, a roadrunner, and a seahorse. Depicted in the above image, the bear sculpture is composed of a mosaic of neurons crafted from different types of wood. Of these sculptures, the seahorse became his favorite. Pilaz, who was born in France, added that the animal is called hippocampe in French—a name it fittingly shares with the seahorse-shaped brain region, the hippocampus.
Though most of his customers are scientists and medical professionals, Pilaz is eager to broaden his audience. He shared that someone recently diagnosed with a brain tumor asked him to help translate their MRI results into a wooden sculpture of the tumor.
“I want to sensitize them to the beauty of the neurons…Our consciousness is directed by neurons, and all of our thoughts are based on biology,” Pilaz explained. “We are those trees.”
Got an eye-catching, science image that tells a story? Submit it for a feature in our Science Snapshot column!
