Lecture 1 - History

Question 1

Trephination

Answer 1

Verona and Williams (1992, unpubl.) found, based on 750 skulls:
most skulls were male (a few women & children were included)
no left or right side predominance
primarily frontal and upper parietal, and associated with fractures and blows to the head
trephination still used today to relieve pressure, remove bone fragments, and evacuate bleedings

Question 2

Edwin Smith Papyrus

Answer 2

Bought by Smith in Egypt in 1862, translated by Dr James Breasted in 1930.
Oldest surgical treatise known, it is a copy of a text originally 3000-2500 years old.
It presents 48 cases, of which 27 concern head injuries
Trephination is not mentioned.
It is the first time the word “brain” is referred to.
First reference to cranial sutures, meninges, CSF, and intracranial pulsations. First accounts of surgical stitching and dressings. Brain injuries linked with changes in functioning of other body parts.

Question 3

James Breasted

Answer 3

Translated the Edwin Smith Papyrus

Question 4

Pythagoras

Answer 4

Postulated that brain was center of reasoning

Question 5

Hippocrates

Answer 5

Brain controls all sense and movement
Emotions arise in the brain
Provided early descriptin of epilepsy

Question 6

Artistotle

Answer 6

Cardiocentric hypothesis - the heart controls mental processes because - the heart is warm, the brain is a radiator to cool the heart, the heart responds when excited

Question 7

Galen

Answer 7

refuted Artistotle
did experiments to show pressure on the brain led to cessation of movement
all physical function based on 4 humors (blood, black bile, yellow bile, mucus/phlegm)

Question 8

Ventricular hypothesis

Answer 8

fluid in the ventricles, not brain tissue, is responsible for mental processes
anterior ventricles control sensation and perception
third ventricles control intelligence and reason
the fourth ventricle controls memory

Originated with the Alexandrian school in Egypt around 300 AD (see Benton, 2000).

Question 9

Leonardo’s Error

Answer 9

his view of the brain was 1200 years old

Question 10

Andreas Vesalius

Answer 10

studied anatomy solely for structure, poor illustration of brain convolutions

Question 11

Rene Descartes

Answer 11

Proposed that mind and body are separate, but interact in the pineal gland.
Mechanistic view of functioning based on mechanical statues at the Royal Gardens at St. Germain.
Developed early concept of the reflex.
Crticized by Damasio for mind / body distinction, and “Cogito, ergo sum”.

Question 12

Monism vs. dualism

Answer 12

Monists: mind and body are the same thing - either both material or both non-material
Dualists: Mind and body are different.
The mind/body problem: How can a non-material mind produce movements in a material body?

Question 13

Hydraulic model

Answer 13

Descartes: The mind acts through the pineal gland. Eyes send information to the brain, where it is examined by the soul and which takes action by tilting the pineal gland (like a joystick) to divert pressurized fluid through the nerves to move the appropriate muscles.

Question 14

Thomas Willis

Answer 14

English anatomist who provided detailed drawings of the circulatory system of the brain. The Circle of Willis is named after him.

Question 15

Franz Gall

Answer 15

With Sputzheim - phrenology

Lectured on cranioscopy,
Theory originated with “observation” that students with prominent eyes had good memory.
Cranial prominences (bumps in skull) reflected well-developed areas of underlying cerebrum.
Posited 27 mental faculties, thought to be innate and fixed.
Studied murderers and sadists to find consistent “bumps”; tended to look for confirmatory evidence.
Forced by imperial edict to leave in 1805; settled in Paris in 1807. Published important neuroanatomical work in 1810 with his assistant and later colleague, Johan
Spurtzheim, who coined the term phrenology.

Question 16

Phrenology

Answer 16

brain is an organ of the ming, mental and moral faculties located in specific areas of surface so that surfeit/deficiencies can be detected by examining the cranium
Empirical attempt to correlate variation in faculties (defined in terms of everyday activities) with objective observation of variation in brain structure.
Located language in the ventrolateral frontal lobe, but also “amativeness” in the cerebellum (based on single patient, “The Passionate Widow”).
Phrenology became highly popular; a book by the English MD and phrenologist George Coombs was one of the four best sellers of the 18th century (together with the Bible, Pilgrim’s Progress, and Gulliver’s Travels). [For Coombe’s Elements of Phrenology online - not his bestseller- go to www.infobahnos.com~pfriesen/combe1.htm].

Question 17

Pierre Flourens

Answer 17

Sharp critic of Gall.
Dedicated a book to Descartes; believed that consciousness was unitary.
Preliminary statement, later elaborated by Lashley, that cortical tissue is equipotential, or able to take over the function of tissue that gets damaged.
Used ablation method to “prove” that damage to the cerebellum (Gall’s center of amativeness) did not affect sexual behavior in chickens and pigeons.
Distinguished motor control from motor coordination (which he located in the cerebellum).
Criticisms: Espoused a “faculty psychology” which distinguished sensation from perception, with sensory-motor functions localized to sub-cortical structures, but with perception, volition, and intellect operating together in unison and spread throughout the cerebrum.
Since his experiments using ablation were rather crude, his animals often failed to survive. Thus they were often still in post-traumatic shock and their brains swollen with edema when tested.
Flourens did not address personality or higher cognitive functions.

Question 18

Jean Baptiste Bouillaud

Answer 18

physician and founding member of a phrenological society,
read a paper to the Royal Academy of Medicine in France in 1825, based on 8 cases,
argued in support of Gall that the left hemisphere controls the right hand for writing, fencing, and drawing, so why not also language and speech movements?

Question 19

Marc Dax

Answer 19

read paper in 1836 in Montpellier presenting cases of speech disorders associated with left hemisphere lesions. Published by his son in 1865.

Question 20

Ernst Auburtin

Answer 20

son-in-law of Bouillaud) presented in 1861 to the Anthropology Society (established by Broca) two cases of speech disorder which he argued were due to pressure to /softening of the frontal lobes. Challenged others to find a single case of speech loss without a frontal lesion.

Question 21

Paul Broca

Answer 21

Attended lecture by Auburtin, took up his challenge when a hemiplegic patient on his ward (Leborgne), who could only say “Tan”, died the next week.
On autopsy Broca found a lesion in the posterior third convolution of the left frontal lobe. He published his findings within a week (later confirmed with a second subject) in the Bulletins de la societe anatomique de Paris in 1861.
Brain studied was that of Louis Leborgne

Question 22

Broca’s area

Answer 22

Broca’s area or the Broca area /broʊˈkɑː/ or /ˈbroʊkə/ is a region in the frontal lobe of the dominant hemisphere (usually the left) of the hominid brain[1] with functions linked to speech production.

Question 23

Theodor von Meynert

Answer 23

Detailed anatomist, specialized in auditory cortex (temporal lobe), and teacher of Wernicke (among others)

First to actually describe case of language comprehension deficit and localize it with autopsy case to the superior temporal gyrus

Question 24

Carl Wernicke

Answer 24

Associate of Thomas Meynert (who tracked auditory pathways to temporal cortex).
Published “The Symptom Complex of Aphasia: A Psychological Study on an Anatomical Basis” in 1874 (age 26).
Formulated theory to reconcile discrete localized cortical centers (Gall/Broca) on the one hand, and homogeneous distribution of mental functions, on the other, with connectionist theory (precursor to network theory).
Connectionist, Distributed Processing Model
Separate motor and sensory regions
Arcuate fasciculus as connection pathway

Question 25

Korbinian Brodmann

Answer 25

Korbinian Brodmann (17 November 1868 – 22 August 1918) was a German neurologist who became famous for his definition of the cerebral cortex into 52 distinct regions from their cytoarchitectonic (histological) characteristics, known as Brodmann areas.[1]

Question 26

Vladimir Betz

Answer 26

Provided first detailed studies of the primary motor neurons in the pyramidal tract in 1874.

Question 27

Fritsch & Hitzig

Answer 27

Provided definitive paper describing how electrical stimulation of the brain on one side led to specific movements in dogs on the other (contralateral) side (1870).
This
1) refuted the widespread notion that the brain was only involved in mental, but not motor or sensory, functions,
2) provided evidence for clear
localization of function, and
3) proved that the cortex could
be stimulated electrically.

Question 28

Pierre Marie

Answer 28

Believed, as did Flourens in the preceding century, in equipotentiality rather than localization of function.
Re-analyzed brains of Broca’s patients
Made criticisms that Lelong had general non-specific atrophy (senility) and was non-aphasic. “Tan” had additional posterior damage, and Marie concluded that his failure to speak was due to intellectual decline rather than inability to speak per se. (See text for more info on p.17 – Leborgne was epileptic from early in life and became aphasic at age 30, followed by further symptoms later on and death at age 51.)

Question 29

John Hughlings Jackson

Answer 29

English physician who pioneered neurology in England, and founding editor (with David Ferrier and James Crighton-Browne) of the journal Brain (1878 to this day), integrating experimental and clinical neurology.
Hughlings Jackson is best known for his characterization of epilepsies of different types (based initially on observations of his wife’s seizures). This lead him to adopt a fairly (though not strictly) localizationist and functionalist approach to the brain as an organ of which the primary function is to enable the person to adapt, by allowing for motor responses to sensory input.

Question 30

Ivan Pavlov

Answer 30

Argued that conditioned responses in dogs cannot be learned if decorticate.

Question 31

Karl Lashley

Answer 31

Trained rats on mazes and other apparatus, lesioning the brain subsequently in search of “engram” (memory trace).
Formulated a theory of equipotentiality - loss in certain sensory areas is compensated for by other areas.
Mass action: behavioral effects are determined by size of lesion

Question 32

Donald Hebb

Answer 32

Theory of cell assemblies: learning occurs when cells or neurons are activated at the same time.
Discovered that lesions in the frontal lobes do not decrease IQ on testing.

Question 33

Hans Lukas Teuber

Answer 33

Together with Henri Hecaen considered founders and guiding spirits of contemporary neuropsychology
Double dissociation of function (lesion in one place causes deficit, lesions elsewhere don’t)
Corollary discharge (consequence on sensory system of motor action)
Originally from Berlin, studied in Basel, Switzerland, and worked at NYU and MIT: founded department of Cognitive Neurosciences.
Stressed the importance in research of a) control groups and b) human subjects review board.

Question 34

double dissociation method

Answer 34

E.g., lesion in Broca’s area (Structure A) but not in Wernicke’s area (structure B) produces deficits in syntax and linguistic expression but not in speech comprehension (with minor exceptions relating to syntax); conversely, lesion in Wernicke’s area (Structure B) produces deficits in speech comprehension but not in syntactic expression (with exceptions relating to semantics).

Question 35

Wilder Penfield

Answer 35

Single cell electrical stimulation in awake patient
Mapped somataosensory homunculus in parietal cortex
Found that “locations” may move a few millimeters on repeated trials (!)
Worked with Brenda Milner (who mentored Sue Corkin, now at MIT)

Question 36

Dominant right hemisphere researchers

Answer 36

Oliver Zangwill – left handers are not always right hemisphere-dominant

Henri Hecaen – founder of Neuropsychologia and demonstrated right hemisphere important for visuospatial and visuoconstructional processes

Arthur Benton – developed tests to asses right hemisphere functioning

Question 37

Memory localization

Answer 37

Scoville & Milner
HM – 27 year-old with to-year history of bilateral temporal lobe seizures due to being knocked over by someone riding a bicycle at age 9. Surgery removed hippocampus, amygdala, and parts of multimodal association cortex of temporal lobe bilaterally.
Result: inability to encode new information; can retrieve old information.

Question 38

Disconnection syndromes

Answer 38

Norman Geschwind & Edith Kaplan
“A Human Cerebral Deconnection Syndrome: A Preliminary Report”. Neurology, 1962 and 1998 (Landmark paper)
Patient was aphasic with left hand, but not the right.
Roger Sperry also reported results from analysis of split-brain patients in 1961.