Introduction to Neuroscience and Neural Cellular Biology

Vocabulary flashcards covering historical neuroscience doctrines, neuronal architecture, functional organization, and glial cell classifications.

Neuroscience

An interdisciplinary field of study centered on the nervous system, combining medicine, biology, chemistry, psychology, engineering, computer science, mathematics, and physics.

Reticular theory

An early theory championed by Camillo Golgi stating that nerves communicate through a continuous nerve net with protoplasmic links connecting everything.

Golgi Method

A staining technique developed by Camillo Golgi using a silver solution that randomly stains approximately 1% of neurons in their entirety.

Neuron Doctrine

The principle stating that individual neurons are discrete contiguous entities and serve as the fundamental structural and signaling units of the nervous system.

Santiago Ramón y Cajal

Known as the Father of modern neuroscience, he formulated the Neuron Doctrine and Principle of dynamic polarity, identified neurons and glia, and shared the 1906 Nobel Prize with Golgi.

Brainbow

A cellular labeling process developed in 2007 by Jeff Lichtman and Joshua Sanes using genetically encoded fluorescent proteins to stain individual neurons in ~100 different colors.

Central Nervous System (CNS)

The major division of the nervous system protected inside the bony skull and vertebral column, consisting of the brain and spinal cord.

Peripheral Nervous System (PNS)

The division of the nervous system that extends beyond or exists entirely outside of the bony skull and vertebral column.

Afferent division

The pathway of the PNS that conveys incoming sensory and visceral stimuli signals from the periphery toward the CNS.

Efferent division

The pathway of the PNS that carries outgoing motor instructions from the CNS to effector organs in the periphery.

Somatic nervous system

A voluntary motor division of the PNS efferent pathway that controls skeletal muscle movement.

Autonomic nervous system

An involuntary motor division of the PNS efferent pathway regulating smooth muscle, cardiac muscle, exocrine glands, and some endocrine glands; split into sympathetic and parasympathetic branches.

Principle of Dynamic Polarity

The rule described by Ramón y Cajal stating that electrical signals within a neuron flow unidirectionally: input at dendrites, integration at the soma, propagation down the axon, and output at the terminal.

Neurofilaments

A specific class of cytoskeletal elements that are unique to neurons.

Endosomes and Ectosomes

Membranous vesicles where endosomes remove proteins from the plasma membrane and ectosomes fuse with the plasma membrane to deliver proteins.

Neuronal Mitochondria

Organelles responsible for generating ATP and buffering calcium; highly concentrated in axon terminals where ATP is required to release neurotransmitters.

Spines

Specialized dendritic protrusions that serve as primary locations for synapses to increase the total number of input points received by a neuron.

Nodes of Ranvier

Breaks in the myelin sheath with concentrated ion channels where depolarization occurs to speed up electrical impulse propagation.

Sensory Receptor Neurons

PNS neurons that perform sensory transduction by converting environmental input into electrical signals.

Projection Neurons

CNS neurons that transmit signals to other neurons situated in distant or distinct CNS regions.

Interneurons

Neurons that provide local connectivity by signaling exclusively to other neurons located within the same or nearby CNS region.

Glia

Non-neural support cells in the nervous system that are more numerous than neurons and express glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP).

Astrocytes

Star-shaped CNS glial cells that maintain extracellular chemical balance (especially calcium) and form the blood-brain barrier via end feet on capillaries.

Oligodendrocytes

CNS glial cells that wrap multiple layers of insulating myelin membrane around several segments of different CNS axons.

Schwann cells

PNS glial cells that provide myelin sheath insulation to a single segment of a single PNS axon.

Microglia

Plastic scavenger glial cells that clear cellular debris from injury sites and modulate inflammation, cell survival, and cell death.