smaller neur2020 final exam set

fMRI

A brain imaging method with high spatial resolution used to precisely determine where things are occurring in the brain.

EEG

Electroencephalography; a technique with high temporal resolution used to determine very precisely when things occur in the brain.

MEG

Magnoencephalography; a method with high temporal resolution that lacks the fine spatial resolution of fMRI or PET.

Psychophysics

The use of techniques, such as signal detection theory, to infer brain function from witnessed behavior.

Dorsal visual pathway

The higher visual pathway argued to be responsible for supporting visually guided action.

Ventral visual pathway

The higher visual pathway responsible for conscious visual awareness and verbal reporting of visual field attributes.

Tonopically organised

An organizational principle of the auditory cortex where adjacent columns preferentially process certain sound frequencies.

Ossicles

Tiny little bones that transmit vibrations from the eardrum into the oval window and provide an amplifying function.

Somatosensory homunculus

A distorted figurine representing the disproportionate amount of cortical tissue dedicated to processing skin regions with fine spatial resolution, such as the lips and fingertips.

Superior colliculus

A fundamental brain structure involved in orienting the individual toward auditory and visual stimuli.

Superior temporal salsis

A key brain structure important for speech perception and multisensory integration.

Principle of inverse effectiveness

The concept that multisensory benefits are most pronounced when the individual sensory stimuli are at their weakest.

McGurk effect

A phenomenon where hearing an auditory 'ba' while seeing a visual 'ga' results in the perception of 'da', revealing the integration of sensory inputs.

Sound-induced flash illusion

An illusion where adding brief sounds causes an individual to report seeing more visual flashes than actually occurred.

Parallel search

Also known as the pop-out phenomenon; a visual search task where the search time does not change regardless of the number of distractors present.

Hemineglect

Also called spatial neglect; a condition typically following parietal lobe damage where a patient ignores objects on the side of space contralateral to the injury.

Posner queuing task

A classic attentional paradigm using valid, invalid, and neutral cues to demonstrate how attention moves under voluntary control.

Withdrawal reflex

A spinal reflex involving only $2$ synapses that causes a limb to pull away from a hot stimulus without involving the brain.

Proprioceptive drift

A shift in the perceived location of one's own hand toward a fake hand, observed during the rubber hand illusion.

Orbital frontal cortex

A part of the brain important for evaluating reward value and influencing subsequent behavior.

Striatum

A brain structure involved in decision making about actions and memories related to relationships between stimuli and responses, such as habit formation.

Amygdala

A nucleus important for emotional responses that plays a role in coding for emotionally charged memories by attaching emotional valence.

Hippocampus

A brain structure critical for spatial memory, exemplified by its enlargement in experienced taxi drivers.

Explicit memory

The type of memory involving conscious recall; patient HM suffered deficits in this area while his implicit memory remained intact.

Long term potentiation

A neural process for strengthening connections that requires substantial glutamate release and a partially depolarized post-synaptic neuron.

Cognitive reserve

A concept suggesting that factors like being young, physically fit, and having high cognitive engagement lead to better recovery prospects after traumatic brain injury.

Compensatory behaviours

A form of behavioral reorganization after injury where patients adopt new methods, such as using a phone for notes, to replicate lost functions.

Howard Dolman apparatus

A device used to test binocular vision precision by requiring a participant to align two rods so they are equidistant from the viewer.

NASA task load workload index

A cognitive measure of workload where higher numbers indicate that a person feels they are working harder cognitively on a task.

Polfric illusion

A depth perception illusion involving a pendulum viewed with a filter over one eye, causing it to appear to rotate in space.

Neuroplasticity

The ability of the brain or nervous system to reorganize itself after injury or illness, rather than generating entirely new cells or structures.

McGurk effect

A multisensory phenomenon where conflicting auditory and visual linguistic inputs result in a perception that is an average of the two.

Superior temporal sulcus (STS)

A brain region implicated in audiovisual language perception; disruption to this area decreases susceptibility to the McGurk effect.

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)

A technique using magnetic pulses to temporarily depress activity in specific regions of the brain.

Newborn brain mass

Approximately $350\,g$.

Adult brain mass

Approximately $1200-1400\,g$.

Ontogenetic development

The developmental period involving rapid synapse formation, pruning, myelination, and glial cell development.

Meningiomas

Encapsulated tumors that grow between the layers of the meninges and can often be removed surgically without regrowing.

Gliomas

Infiltrative tumors originating from glial cells that spread through brain tissue and are difficult to remove completely.

Metastatic tumors

Infiltrative tumors that originate from cancer cells carried to the brain via the bloodstream from other parts of the body.

Gamma knife

A form of radiographic surgery using a focused high-power X-ray to destroy brain structures like tumors.

Cerebral hemorrhage

A type of stroke caused by a ruptured blood vessel that leaks blood into the surrounding neural tissue.

Aneurysm

A balloon-like dilation that forms in an artery due to restricted flow and pressure, which can damage the brain if it bursts.

Cerebral ischemia

A type of stroke caused by a blockage in the blood supply to the brain.

Thrombosis

A blood clot that forms at the site of a blockage in the vasculature.

Embolism

A blockage caused by an object, such as a blood clot or fat, that has traveled from another part of the circulatory system.

Arteriosclerosis

The thickening of artery walls, which narrows channels and increases blood pressure.

Glutamate cascade

The process in which ischemic neurons release excessive glutamate, causing massive depolarization and death in postsynaptic neurons.

Glutamate antagonist

A drug that can reduce the impact of the glutamate cascade if administered very quickly after a stroke.

Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE)

A form of dementia and cognitive impairment resulting from the cumulative effects of multiple mild traumatic brain injuries (concussions).

Encephalitis

Inflammation of the brain, often caused by bacterial or viral infections.

Neurotoxins

Chemicals such as mercury or lead that specifically harm the nervous system; mercury exposure is associated with the expression "mad as a hatter."

Apoptosis

Programmed, orderly cell death where dying parts are packaged into vesicles (blebbing) to avoid harming surrounding tissue.

Necrosis

Passive, disordered cell death resulting from injury where neurons swell and break apart, potentially scattering toxic components.

Epilepsy

A neurological disorder characterized by repeated seizures arising from a person's own brain dysfunction.

Tonic-clonic seizure

A generalized seizure (Grand Mal) characterized by loss of consciousness, violent convulsions, and hypoxia.

Absence seizure

A non-convulsive seizure common in children, characterized by a "zoning out" appearance and a characteristic $3\,Hz$ EEG wave.

Parkinson's disease

A progressive disease caused by the loss of dopamine-producing cells in the substantia nigra, resulting in tremors at rest and muscular rigidity.

L-DOPA

A precursor to dopamine that crosses the blood-brain barrier and is used to treat Parkinson's symptoms.

Deep brain stimulation (DBS)

A surgical treatment for Parkinson's that implants electrodes into the subthalamic nucleus to reduce inhibitory signals to the substantia nigra.

Multiple Sclerosis (MS)

An autoimmune disease that destroys the myelin sheaths of axons in the central nervous system, leaving behind scar tissue called sclerosis.

Amyloid plaques

Stained blue protein aggregates that get entangled with neural tissue in Alzheimer's patients, causing cell death.

Neurofibrillary tangles

Internal cellular structures in the cytoplasm that contribute to the pathology of Alzheimer's disease.

Kindling model

An animal model of epilepsy where repeated mild electric shocks are used to induce permanent convulsive responses.

MPTP model

An animal model for Parkinson's disease using a specific neurotoxin discovered in young intravenous drug users who produced synthetic heroin incorrectly.

Anterograde degeneration

The degeneration of the distal segment of an axon after it has been severed.

Retrograde degeneration

The degeneration of the proximal segment (the part attached to the cell body) of an axon after being severed.

Collateral sprouting

A process where healthy axons grow new branches to occupy synapses left vacant by a degenerated neighboring neuron.

Cognitive reserve

The idea that higher education, IQ, and cognitive activity can mitigate the functional impact of brain damage.

Neurogenesis

The spontaneous generation of new neurons; in adults, this occurs modestly in the hippocampus (specifically the dentate nucleus).

Mirror box therapy

A treatment developed by Ramachandran to alleviate phantom limb pain by providing visual feedback that "tricks" the brain into perceiving the limb in a relaxed state.

Neuroplasticity

The process by which the brain reorganises itself, with learning being a prototypical example where motor skills or memory retention correspond to physical changes in the brain.

Henry Mollison

A famous clinical patient (formerly known as HM) who, at $27$ years old, underwent surgery to remove his medial temporal lobes to treat severe epilepsy, resulting in devastating memory deficits.

Retrograde Amnesia

A backward-acting deficit in memory for events that occurred prior to a trauma, such as a head injury or surgery.

Anterograde Amnesia

A forward-acting deficit in the ability to form new memories after a trauma or surgery.

Short-term Memory

The ability to hold small amounts of information for a brief period while it is being attended to, such as a phone number.

Long-term Memory

The system responsible for storing or maintaining changes in the brain over an extended period of time.

Digit Span Plus One Test

A classic long-term memory test where a clinician reads digits out for a patient to repeat, adding one additional digit each trial; Henry Mollison could only manage $7$ digits after $25$ trials.

Block Tapping Test

A test for global amnesia involving an array of $9$ blocks; it tests memory for information presented across all modalities by requiring a patient to repeat a sequence of taps.

Global Amnesia

An absence of memory for information presented in all modalities, including sounds and visual sequences.

Mirror Drawing Test

A test of implicit sensory-motor memory where a subject traces a star via a mirror; Henry Mollison showed improvement over $3$ days despite having no conscious awareness of previous practice.

Incomplete Pictures Test

A measure of implicit visual recall using sets of $20$ objects shown at various levels of completion; performance is measured by the level at which the object is correctly identified.

Implicit Long-term Memory

Memories demonstrated by improved performance on tasks without conscious awareness or the ability to explicitly report memory of the event.

Explicit Long-term Memory

Memories that require the participant to demonstrate conscious awareness and explicitly report their memory of a task or event.

Semantic Memory

Explicit memories for general facts and information, such as knowledge of a language or mathematical equations.

Episodic Memory

Explicit memories for specific events in one's life, such as remembering eating breakfast or having a coffee.

Medial Temporal Lobe Amnesia

A condition characterizing patients with preserved intellectual functioning but difficulty forming explicit memories while retaining the ability to form implicit memories.

Korsakoff's Syndrome

A memory disorder prevalent in heavy drinkers ($35$ or more drinks per week) caused by a thiamine deficiency, involving damage to the medial thalamus and neocortex.

Medial Dorsal Nuclei of the Thalamus

A specific brain structure that is nearly universally degraded or damaged in patients suffering from Korsakoff's syndrome.

Alzheimer's Disease

A progressive disease characterized by mild memory deficits in early stages that deteriorate into dementia, affecting both explicit and short-term memory.

Memory Consolidation

The process by which fragile memories stored in short-term circuits are strengthened over time into robust long-term memories resistant to disruption.

Donald Hebb

A famous researcher who proposed that memories are stored in short-term circuits by reverberating neural activity and that 'neurons that fire together wire together.'

Electroconvulsive Shock (ECS)

A traumatic electric shock therapy used to test memory consolidation; it erases memories that have not yet undergone consolidation, which can last up to $3$ years.

Ischemia

A specific kind of stroke resulting from a blockage in a blood vessel that cuts off blood delivery to a particular brain region.

Delayed Non-Matching to Sample Test

An experimental paradigm used with monkeys and rats to measure memory by requiring the subject to identify a novel object after a delay.

Place Cells

Neurons in the hippocampus that respond only when an individual is in a specific familiar location, effectively creating a 'place field.'

Posterior Hippocampus

The part of the hippocampus in humans specifically important for recalling spatial information, found to be larger in London taxi drivers.

Concept Cells

Also called 'Jennifer Aniston neurons' or 'Halle Berry neurons,' these cells in the medial temporal lobes respond to complex, specific ideas or familiar individuals.

Ngram Cells

Neurons that undergo a lasting change in response to an experience; when activated or inhibited, they trigger or repress the retrieval of the original experience.

Long-term Potentiation (LTP)

Enduring changes in the efficiency of synaptic transmission that serve as the cellular basis of long-term memory.