The Brain

The Brain

The brain is made up of neurons and glial cells. Glial cells support neural cells.

Lesions: cutting the brain and looking for a change. Brain tumors also lesion brain tissues.

Brain Structures

Broken into three parts...

1. Medulla Oblongata: controls heart rate, breathing, and blood pressure. ex: involuntary functions
2. Pons: connects the hind,mid, and forebrain together.
3. Cerebellum: Located in the back of our head. Another name is "little brain". It coordinated muscle movements and balance.

Midbrain: coordinates simple movements with sensory information. It contains the reticular formation.
Thalamus: in the forebrain. It deals with sensory information and sends them to appropriate areas of the brain. It's like a switchboard. It deals with all the senses BUT smell.
Limbic System: emotional control center of the brain. Made up of the hippocampus, hypothalamus, and the amygdala.
Hypothalamus: pea sized in brain, but plays a not so pea sized role. It controls body temperature, hunger, thirst, and sexual arousal (libido).
Amygdala: vital for our basic emotions... especially fear.
Hippocampus: memory processing.

Cerebral Cortex: top layer of brain
-contain wrinkles called fissures
-the fissures increase surface area of our brain.
-Laid out, the fissure would look like a  large pizza.

Hemispheres

• Divided into left and right hemisphere.
• Contralateral control- left controls the right side of our body. The right brain controls the left side of our body.
• Righties are better at logic while lefties are better at spatial and creative tasks.

Split Brain Patients

• The corpus callosum connects both the left and right hemisphere of the cerebral cortex.
• When removed, you have a split brain patient.

The Cerebral Cortex is made up of  4 lobes...

1. Frontal Lobe

• Abstract through emotion and thoughts.
• contains motor cortex: sends signals through our body using muscle movements.
• contains Broca's area: responsible for controlling muscles that produce speech.
• Damaged Broca's area is called Broca's Aphasia: unable to make movements or talk.

     2. Parietal Lobe

• contains sensory cortex: receives incoming touch sensations from the rest of the body.
• Most of the parietal lobe is made up of association areas: any area not associated with receiving sensory information or coordinating muscle movements.

      3. Occipital Lobe

• deals with vision
• contains visual cortex: interprets messages from out eyes into images we can understand.

      4. Temporal Lobe

• processed through the ears.
• contains Wernike's area: interprets written and spoken speech.
• Wernike's Aphasia: unable to understand language- syntax and grammar is jumbled.