'We need their brains': donating to the brain bank in search of a dementia cure

Scientists studying the tissue bequeathed to the Sydney Brain Bank hope it will lead them to an eventual cure for neurodegenerative diseases

It's a rainy Wednesday morning and Dr Andrew Affleck is driving more carefully than usual on his way to the Neuroscience Research Australia building in Randwick.

It's not just the slick, crowded roads putting the edge on his caution; in the boot of his car, cocooned in several layers of protective container and nestled in ice, is the brain of a human being who was alive only a few hours earlier.