Unit 2

Question 1

For humans, what is the front/back of brain?
What about for animals?

Answer 1

Anterior/Posterior (before, after)
Rostral/Caudal (beak, tail)

Question 2

For humans, what is the ‘inside/outside’ of brain?
What about for animals?

Answer 2

Medial/Lateral (inside, outside)

Question 3

For humans, what is the above/below of brain?
What about for animals?

Answer 3

Superior/Inferior (above, below)
Dorsal/Ventral (back, belly)

Question 4

Horizontal vs. Coronal vs. Sagittal planes

Answer 4

Horizontal: “horizon” A horizontal slice. a top-down perspective

Coronal: “crown” a top-down cut that views the front/back.

Sagittal: “arrow” A 3D view from side. Cut through the face

Question 5

Grey Matter vs. White Matter

Answer 5

Grey Matter: Where cells communicate. Where synapses are. Forms the cortex. The outermost layer. (inside layer for spinal cord)

White Matter: Axons that connect the grey matter. Highways or wires. A bunch of axons. Myelination. Inside layer. (outside for spinal cord)

Question 6

What are Sulci and Gyri?

Answer 6

They make up the folds of the brain, helping to create more space and surface area for grey matter.

Sulci: The grooves on the brain’s surface.
Gyri: The bumps between sulci.

Question 7

Main Sulci

(What are they? Purpose?)

Answer 7

They are landmarks for the brain to divide the brain into regions.

Longitudinal Sulcus: has its own gyrification. splits left and right hemisphere. (anterior-posterior cut)

Central Sulcus: no gyrification itself. divides parietal and frontal lobes. (medial-lateral cut)

Lateral Sulcus: at the side of the brain. has its own sulci and gyri. has insular cortex.

Question 8

Insular cortex

Answer 8

grey matter area deep within the lateral sulcus. not visible from the surface.

Question 9

What percentage of grey matter of the brain is in the cerebellum?

Answer 9

40-60%?

Question 10

What are the four lobes of the brain? Acronym?

Answer 10

Frontal Parietal Occipital Temporal

(FPOT)

Question 11

What is the neuron doctrine?

Answer 11

The nervous system is made of many individual cells that don’t touch.

Question 12

What is the charge of a neuron at its resting state?

Answer 12

-70mV

Question 13

Why do neurons not just keep firing?

Answer 13

Neurotransmitters tell the postsynaptic neuron whether to fire or not.

Question 14

Feature detectors

Answer 14

The first neurons that activate in response to some sensory stimulus. They contain the lowest level of neural processing, the simplest possible information about the stimulus.

Question 15

How is information processed from feature detectors?

Answer 15

Hierarchical Processing.

Subsequent neural activity in steps that makes sense of the basic info. Meaning increases at each step (low –> high level). Neurons interact with many parts of the brain, making the interpretation more abstract at each step.

Question 16

Neural Representation

Answer 16

Everything we experience is represented in our nervous system.

we can’t do anything without nerves. our brain can’t do anything by itself.

Question 17

Three types of “coding” about how information is represented by neurons.

Brain neural coding strategies.

Answer 17

Specificity Coding: A specific neuron activates in response to feature detectors, representing a specific pattern.

Population Coding: A group of neurons activate in response to feature detectors to represent an interpretation.

Sparse Coding: Some neurons of a region activate to feature detectors.

Question 18

When getting more familiar with a particular stimulus (eg. Bill), what happens to feature detectors and connections?

Answer 18

Feature detectors don’t change (the raw data remains the same).

The connections to other regions get more accurate.

Question 19

How do neurons translate to our conscious perception of some stimulus (eg. Bill’s face)?

Answer 19

Mind-body problem. There’s no neuroscience answer to this. Philosophical.

Question 20

Localized vs. Distributed Processing

Answer 20

Localized: one region does the higher-level processing
Distributed: multiple regions collaborate in higher-level processing

Question 21

Structural vs. Functional Connectivity

How can researchers explore this connectivity?

Answer 21

Structural: physically connected (through white matter track)
Functional: one area’s activation activates together with another. correlated activity.

Using precise structural (eg. DTI for structural connectivity) or functional (eg. fMRI/fNIRS for functional connectivity) scans.

Question 22

What are the 3 ways researchers differentiate brain regions?

Answer 22

Macroanatomical Features: either Sulci and Gyri (eg. AAL-3)

Microanatomical Features: neurotransmitter receptors, myelin density, cytoarchitecture, cortical thickness.

Connectivity:

Question 23

What atlas looks at connectivity? What is connectivity?

Answer 23

Brainnetome.

See which coactivate or connected by white matter (structural/functional)

Question 24

What are brainspaces? 2 Main ones?

Answer 24

Coordinate spaces for the brain.

MNI (a combination of 152 MRIs)
Talairach - from a dissected brain