Neuroscience Flashcards
Gray matter
Cell bodies and dendrites
White matter
Nerve fibers, axon bundles, and myelin sheathing
Brain stem
Autonomic functions, regulates CNS and connects PNS and upper brain
Regulates cardiac, respiratory function, BP, alertness. Maintains consciousness and regulates sleep
Hindbrain
Medulla, Pons, Cerebellum, Reticular formation base
Myelencephalon/Medulla
Mainly controls reflexes but also controls sleep, attention, and movement
Metencephalon- Pons
Connects brain parts to spine
Metencephalon- Cerebellum
Muscle coordination, balance, and posture
Some memory, learning, emotion
Reticular formation
Oldest part of the brain
Alertness, thirst, sleep, involuntary muscles like heart
Mesencephalon
Midbrain
Tectum, tegmentum, rest of reticular formation
Tectum
Controls vision and hearing
Tegmentum
Reticular formation, sensorimotor system, analgesic effect of opiates
Forebrain
Diencephalon and telencephalon
Diencephalon
Thalamus and hypothalamus
Processes incoming sensory info and relays to other parts of the brain
Interaction between CNS and endocrine system
Telencephalon
Limbic system, hippocampus, amygdala, cingulate gyrus
Corticospinal tract
Connections between brain and spine
Thalamus
Channels sensory information to the cerebral cortex, motor control
Problems in Thalamus
Abnormal movement, disruption of sleep, can’t integrate sensory input, attention difficulty
Hypothalamus
Controls ANS biological motivations, like hunger and thirst, and pituitary gland, regulates sleep/wake libido cycle, homeostasis
Problems in Hypothalamus
Disrupted sleep, change in appetite, weight change, body heat dysregulation
Pituitary gland
“Master gland” of endocrine/hormone system
Limbic System
Fleeing, fighting, feeding, and fornication
Plays a role in regulating human emotion (affective tone) and sleep
Hippocampus
Memory, transfers from short term to long term memory, navigation and spatial
Problems in hippocampus
Forgetfulness, inattention, amnesia, problems encoding new material
Amygdala
Controls emotional reactions like fear and anger, arousal
Problem in amygdala
Mania, depression, emotional dysregulation, anger, negative thinking
Fornix
Connects hypothalamus to cerebrum and hippocampus
Problems with sleep, appetite and memory
Mesolimbic system
Found in limbic system, brain’s reward pathway (dopamine)
Plays a role in mood disorders and schizophrenia
Hypothalamic- Pituitary- Adrenal (HPA)
Feedback loop links hypothalamus, pituitary, and adrenal glands.
Regulates reactions to stressSignificant role in PTSD
Cingulate Gyrus
Link areas in the brain dealing with emotion and decisions
Cognitive flexibility, shifting attention
Anterior cingulate cortex
Impulse control, adaptability, cooperation, decision making
Symptomatic: Obsession, compulsion, worrying, roadrage
Posterior cingulate cortex
Memory
Symptomatic: holding onto negative past events
Fusiform Gyrus
Facial recognition- damage in dementia
Prosopagnosia-inability to recognize familiar faces
Cerebral Cortex
Outer ½ inch of the cerebral hemispheres. Seat of intellectual and sensory functioning and split into lobes
Neocortex
90% of the cerebral cortex,
The other 10 percent has fewer than 6 layers and more primitive
Thinking, language, higher level functions
Frontal lobe
Speech, reasoning, problem solving
Holds Broca’s area for speech
Premotor cortex, motor cortex, prefrontal regions
Occipital lobe
Most specialized, controls vision
Parietal lobe
Responsible for somatosensory system
Speech, touch, pain, proprioception
Integrates sensory info for movement
Temporal lobe
Responsible for hearing, processing auditory information, affective tone, memory, recognition. Also includes Wenicke’s area for speech
Gyri
Bumps on the cortex surface
Sulci
Fissures on the cortex surface
Meninges
Tough connective tissues that protect the brain and spinal cord
Dura, arachnoid, pia, subarachnoid filled with CSF
Blood-Brain barrier
Protects the brain by making it extremely difficult for toxic substances to pass from blood to brain since cells in blood vessels are tightly packed
Ventricles
Chambers filled with cerebrospinal fluid that insulates the brain from shock
Produce Cerebral Spinal Fluid
Superior Colliculus
Controls visual reflexes and appears as bumps on the brainstem
Inferior colliculus
Controls auditory reflexes and appears as bumps on the brainstem
Basal Ganglia
Control large, voluntary muscle movements, plays role in regulating thoughts, feelings
Degeneration related to dysfunction in Parkinsons and Huntingtons
Basal Ganglia Structures
Caudate, Putamen, Nucleus accumbens, Globus pallidus, Substantia nigra
Caudate
Regulates information, movements thoughts and feelings
Symptomatic: Anxiety
Putamen
Acts with Caudate to influence motor activities
Symptomatic: Tics, fine motor problems, poor gate
Nucleus Accumbens
Liaison with limbic system
Symptomatic: paranoia depression, decreased motivation
Globus Pallidus
Relays info from caudate and putamen to thalamus
Symptomatic: poor concentration
Substantia Nigra
Produces dopamine
Symptomatic: tremors, rigidity
Prefrontal system
Executive functioning, commonly implicated in psychiatric disorders
Dorsolateral, orbitofrontal, and medial basal
Dorsolateral
Problem solving, planning, self, regulation, sequencing, critical thinking, temporal ordering
Orbital Frontal
Inhibition, socially appropriate behavior
Symptomatic: impulsivity, poor judgment
Medial Basal
Goal-directed behavior, ability to feel and express emotions, forward thinking
Symptomatic brady kinesia, flat affect
Bradykinesia
Slow movement- Parkinson’s disease
Cortical association areas
Areas on the cortex that respond to certain functions, damage in certain areas would result in certain dysfunction like apraxia, agnosia etc.
Apraxia
Inability to organize movement
Agnosia
Difficulty processing sensory information
Aphasia
Language disorder
Alexia
Inability to read
Agraphia
Inability to write
Broca’s and Wernicke’s Area
Left frontal lobe
Broca’s aphasia
Can understand but has a difficulty speaking
Wernicke’s aphasia
Can speak but no longer understands how to correctly choose words
Speech is fluent but nonsensical
Hyperphagia
Overeating with no satiation of hunger
Damage to hypothalamus
Sham rage
Incredible rage easily provokes when cerebral cortex is removed
Stereotaxic Instruments
Implanting electrodes into animals brains in experiments
fMRI
Measures oxygen flow
Measures activity during certain tasks
PET
Scan glucose metabolism to measure activity in certain regions
NEURONS
NEURONS
Efferent nerve cells
Part of somatic nervous system (PNS), carries impulses from sensory cells to CNS
Afferent nerve cells
Part of somatic nervous system (PNS), carries impulses from CNS to sensory cells
Mirror neurons
Activated when observing another person’s behavior, important for empathy, dysregulation in autism
Frontal and parietal lobes
Dendrite
Receive impulses
Cell Body (Soma)
Largest central portion
Gray matter
Nucleus that directs activity
Axon Hillock
Where the soma and axon connect
Axon
Transmits impulses of the neuron
Bundles are nerve fibers
White matter
Nodes of Ranvier
Dips between beads of myelin sheath
Myelin Sheath
Fatty sheath that allows faster conduction of axon impulses
Terminal buttons
Ends of axon, contain synaptic vessels that hold neurotransmitters
Neurotransmitters
Chemicals that stimulate nearby cells
Cell membrane
Covers the whole neuron and has selective permeability
Sometimes lets ions (positive charges) through
Synapse or synaptic gap
Space between two neurons where they communicate
Presynaptic cell
End of one neuron
The terminal buttons
Postsynaptic cell
Beginning of another neuron
The dendrites
Glial Cells
Other cells in nervous system
Help support neurons
Oligodendrocytes, Schwann cells
Half the volume of CNS
Oligodendrocytes
Provide myelin in the central nervous system
Schwann cells
Provide myelin in the peripheral nervous system