Week 1 Material

What does cognitive neuroscience focus on?

• how the brain shapes the mind and influences our perception of things

• brain-behavior to mind-behavior

• how we feel, think, speak, behave, and interact with others

• memory, attention, language

What is the story of patient HM and his memory?

H.M suffered from severe epilepsy and underwent brain surgery to treat it. His hippocampus and amygdala were removed. After surgery, he developed retrograde amnesia and severe anterograde amnesia, but his motor learning was preserved.

Retrograde amnesia

when you can’t remember things before a brain injury

Anterograde amnesia

inability to form new memories after brain injury

Prefrontal Cortex function

the control center of the brain: higher thinking, emotional control, decision making, social skills, learning new things and gaining new experiences

Central nervous system is made up of

the brain and spinal cord

Peripheral Nervous System is made up of

nerves that connect to our spinal cord and brain

Sympathetic vs Parasympathetic system

sympathetic system is fight or flight response while the parasympathetic system helps you relax

Gray matter is made up of

neuron cell bodies

White matter is made up of

axons and glia cells

What is connectomics?

it is a new field of neuroscience that focuses on making maps of neuron connections in the brain. through seeing how things are wired, this can help us understand brain functions

What are structural brain connections?

they refer to the actual, physical pathways that are formed by dendrites and axons that link neurons together.

What are functional brain connections?

they refer to the actual synchronized activity and coordination of the brain regions when you do specific functional tasks (aka which part of the brain is correlated with which)

What do mirror neurons do?

they are the neurons that are active when you are watching someone do something and learning how to do it

Forebrain

Midbrain

Hindbrain

Where is Broca’s Area located?

in the inferior frontal gyrus of the frontal lobe

Where is Wernicke’s Area located?

in the superior temporal gyrus of the temporal lobe

Wernicke’s Area

language comprehension

Broca’s Area

speech control

Function of Parietal Lobe

sensations, language, attention, body awareness

Function of Occipital Lobe

vision, perception

Function of the Frontal Lobe

decision making, emotional control, problem solving, learning, behavior

Function of Temporal Lobe

hearing, language, memory

The motor homunculus is located in the

prefrontal cortex

The sensory homunculus is located in the

parietal lobe

Gray matter contains

neuron cell bodies, dendrites without myelin

White matter contains

myelinated axons

What is the function of the Corpus Callosum?

to connect the two hemispheres of brain, allowing them to communicate and complex thinking to occur

What is the function of the Basal Ganglia?

to control movement, reward center, reward-based learning, habit forming.

What part of the basal ganglia is involved in Parkinson’s disease?

the substantia nigra: home to dopamine producing neurons, but in Parkinson’s disease there is reduced production of dopamine