Lecture 2: Basic Structural and Functional Brain Anatomy

Question 1

What is the nervous system made up of?

Answer 1

Central nervous system and peripheral nervous system

Question 2

What is the central nervous system made up of?

Answer 2

Brain and Spinal chord

Question 3

What is the brain made up of?

Answer 3

Brain stem and Cerebral Hemispheres

Question 4

What are the three cerebral hemispheres?

Answer 4

1. Cortex
2. Sub-cortical structures
3. White-matter tracts

Question 5

What is the peripheral nervous system made of?

Answer 5

Somatic nervous system and autonomic nervous system

Question 6

What is the autonomic nervous system made up of?

Answer 6

Sympathetic nervous system and parasympathetic nervous system

Question 7

What are the functions of the neurons in the the brain stem, thalamus, and hypothalamus?

Answer 7

respiration, digestion, glucose metabolism, arousal, regulation of body temperature, blood pressure, swallowing, coughing, sneezing, vomiting, circadian rhythms, etc.

Question 8

What is the name of a specific group of neurons in the brain stem, thalamus, and hypothalamus?

Answer 8

The Reticular Formation

The reticular formation, a complex network of cells in the core of the brainstem is involved in the control of arousal and sleep.

Question 9

What is the Thalamus?

Answer 9

The Thalamus acts as a relay station in the brain, transmitting sensory and motor signals

Question 10

What are the two nucleus’ in the hypothalamus?

Answer 10

The superchiasmatic nucleus and ventromedial nuclues

Question 11

What is the function of the superchiasmatic nucleus?

Answer 11

controls the circadian (24 hr) biological rhythms

Question 12

What is the function of the ventromedial nucleus?

Answer 12

Controls the conversion of blood glucose into body fat

Question 13

What is the corpus callosum?

Answer 13

White matter tracts connective the two hemispheres

Question 14

What is intercallosal transfer?

Answer 14

Electrical impulses that travel from neurons in one hemispheres and reach neurons in the other hemisphere via the corpus callosum

Question 15

What is grey matter?

Answer 15

On the outer part of the brain: cerebral cortex. At the level of micro-structure, the cortex is made of bodies of nerve cells - neurons

Question 16

What is white matter?

Answer 16

Situated under the grey matter. Is made of the long elongated part of the nerve cells - axon.

Question 17

What is grey matter partly formed by?

Answer 17

Body and dendrites

Question 18

What is the axon of a neuron?

Answer 18

Part of white matter. They are covered in a protective layer of myelin. The white appearance comes from the light colour of myelin

Question 19

What is gyrus?

Answer 19

Plateau on cortical surface

Question 20

What are sulcus?

Answer 20

Fold/ ditch in cortical surface; major sulci are offered referred to as fissures

Question 21

How are the hemispheres made up?

Answer 21

Each Cerebral Hemisphere is divided into four lobes, separated by three major sulci: the central, lateral and parietal-occipital sulci

Question 22

What is the top of the brain called when looking at one hemisphere?

Answer 22

Superior (dorsal)

Question 23

What is the bottom of the brain called when looking at one hemisphere?

Answer 23

Inferior (ventral)

Question 24

What is the front of the brain called when looking at one hemisphere?

Answer 24

Anterior (rostral)

Question 25

What is the back of the brain called when looking at one hemisphere?

Answer 25

Posterior (caudal)

Question 26

What is the top of the brain called when looking at both hemispheres, down the centre of the brain?

Answer 26

Medial superior

Question 27

What is the bottom of the brain called when looking at both hemispheres, down the centre of the brain?

Answer 27

Medial inferior

Question 28

What is the left of the brain called when looking at both hemispheres, down the centre of the brain from the front?

Answer 28

Lateral (right)

Question 29

What is the right of the brain called when looking at both hemispheres, down the centre of the brain from the front?

Answer 29

Lateral (left)

Question 30

What are the names of the three slices?

Answer 30

1. Axial 2. Coronal 3. Sagittal

Question 31

What is an axial slice?

Answer 31

From top down in horizontal slices

Question 32

What is a coronal slice?

Answer 32

From front to back in vertical slices

Question 33

What is a sagittal slice?

Answer 33

From hemisphere to hemisphere in vertical slices

Question 34

What is cytoarchitecture?

Answer 34

Brodmann found that cortical regions cary in the detailed cellular structure

Question 35

What is phrenology?

Answer 35

School of thought that attempted to localise mental processes anatomically

Question 36

What is equipotentiality?

Answer 36

- Flourens was one of the earliest proponents of the idea that cognitive functions (such a memory) are not localised but diffusely distributed in the brain - Following experiments on animals, he concluded that basic physiological regulation and motor functions (breathing, circulation) are localised (e.g. breathing regulation in the brain stem and control of balance in the cerebellum) - However he could not localise cognitive functions and concluded that different parts of the brain are equally involved in these functions (equipotential)

Question 37

What does the primary motor cortex control?

Answer 37

The body, head, and limb movement

Question 38

What is the somatosensory cortex responsible for?

Answer 38

the sensation of touch, sensation from the skin as well as sensation from muscles and some internal organs

Question 39

What is the primary visual cortex responsible for?

Answer 39

Basic vision

Question 40

What is the primary auditory cortex responsible for?

Answer 40

Basic hearing

Question 41

What are the olfactory and gustatory cortices responsible for?

Answer 41

Smell and taste, respectively

Question 42

What is the hierarchical organisation in senses?

Answer 42

Primary sensory area - the cortical area where sensory information arrives Secondary sensory area - where the perceptual information gets passed to for more sophisticated processing to take place Association areas - Where information from different modalities of difference types is integrates

Question 43

What is the Primary Visual Cortex?

Answer 43

- The primary visual cortex is the first place of a series of places where vision is “created” - Different regions of the visual field (real world) are perceived in different regions in the primary visual cortex - There is a correspondence (a mapping) between the spatial structure of the primary visual cortex and the spatial structure of the real world - Visual processing is then split into a pathway specialised in the analysis of the stimulus features (colour, shape)- the ‘**what’ pathway.** - And a pathway specialised in rapid detection of stimulus location and motion- the **‘where’ pathway**

Question 44

What are Fusiform Gyrus?

Answer 44

- Cells in the inferior temporal lobe (the Fusiform gyrus) seem to respond to highly complex visual stimuli - There is an area in the Fusiform that seems to specialise in face recognition (Fusiform Face Area, FFA) - Neuroimaging studies of face processing consistently find FFA activation - Damage to FFA or cell loss in FFA due to degeneration often result in impaired face recognition- ***prosopagnosia***

Question 45

What is the hierarchical organisation of motor control?

Answer 45

The primary motor cortex exerts direct control over movement However, other areas (premotor and supplementary motor) are involved in the planning of movement and integration of motor behaviour with other behaviour

Question 46

What are the challenges in functional localisation?

Answer 46

- The dorso-lateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) is the region of the brain which expanded more than any other in the course evolution of primates… - Yet patients with lesions to this region rarely show selective/specific deficits

Question 47

What is the function of the dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex?

Answer 47

- Supports diverse cognitive tasks - Its function might be to enables rapid focus shifts, task separation, and structured problem-solving and it seems central to intelligent thought and action.

Question 48

What is the function of Broca's area?

Answer 48

Speech production

Question 49

What did Fedorenco et al (2012) find about Broca's area?

Answer 49

Fedorenco et al. (2012) found using fMRI that Broca’s area contains two distinct types of subregions: one specialized for language processing and another more general-purpose region engaged in a wide range of cognitive tasks. These subregions lie side by side, reflecting both specialization and broad engagement across different cognitive domains.

Question 50

What does Localisation of Function tell a psychologist?

Answer 50

- Can the anatomical region tell us anything about the psychological process that resides there, or the relationship between that process and behaviour? - It might – consider the following kind of inference often made in neuroimaging, the ***reverse inference*** - Say you are a psychologist interested in Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, particularly in the “flashbacks” experienced by individuals with PTSD - You want to know if the flashbacks are predominantly visual or whether they involve auditory, tactile, olfactory imagery - Then scanning someone’s brain while they experience flashbacks may provide you with the answer by comparing the activation of the areas associated with different kinds of imagery