Outline of the human brain explained
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to the human brain:
Structure of the human brain
Visible anatomy
- Human brain – central organ of the nervous system located in the head of a human being
- Neuroanatomy
- Regions in the human brain:
- Significant components:
- Arcuate fasciculus – neural pathway connecting the junction between the temporal and parietal lobes with the frontal cortex in the brain
- Broca's area – region of the brain with functions linked to speech production
- Triangular part of inferior frontal gyrus – part of Broca's area that contributes to propositional (true/false) language comprehension
- Caudate nucleus – located within the basal ganglia and involved in learning and memory
- Central nucleus of the amygdala – the major output nucleus of the amygdala, participates in receiving and processing pain information
- Nucleus accumbens – collection of neurons in the pleasure center that is thought to play a role in reward, pleasure, laughter, addiction, aggression, fear, and the placebo effect
- Pineal gland – a small endocrine gland in the vertebrate brain that produces melatonin, a hormone that affects wake/sleep patterns
- Ventricular system – set of structures containing cerebrospinal fluid which bathes and cushions the brain and spinal cord within the skull
- Cranial nerve – neuron bundles that connect to the brain on one end, and to locations outside the brain on the other, without having a junction inside the spinal column
- Cranial nerve zero – controversial but commonly found nerve which may be vestigial or may be related to sensing pheromones
- Olfactory nerve (cranial nerve 1) – smell
- Optic nerve (cranial nerve 2) – sight
- Oculomotor nerve (cranial nerve 3) – eye movement (except rotation)
- Trochlear nerve (cranial nerve 4) – eye rotation
- Trigeminal nerve (cranial nerve 5) – sensation from the face and certain motor functions such as biting and chewing
- Abducens nerve (cranial nerve 6) – certain eye rotation
- Facial nerve (cranial nerve 7) – facial expression and taste sensations from the tongue
- Vestibulocochlear nerve (cranial nerve 8) – hearing and balance
- Glossopharyngeal nerve (cranial nerve 9) – sensation from the throat, tonsils, part of the tongue, heart, and stomach. Also facilitates swallowing.
- Vagus nerve (cranial nerve 10) – output to the intestines and heart, taste information, deep/crude touch, pain, temperature of outer ear
- Accessory nerve (cranial nerve 11) – specific muscles of the shoulder and neck. Modern descriptions often consider the cranial component as part of the vagus nerve, calling what is left the spinal accessory nerve.
- Hypoglossal nerve (cranial nerve 12) – muscles of the tongue
- Spinal cord – bundle of neurons that connects the brain to the peripheral nervous system and coordinates certain automatic reflexes
- Peripheral nervous system – nerves outside the brain and spinal cord
Microscopic level anatomy
History of the human brain
Brain development
This development section covers changes in brain structure over time. It includes both the normal development of the human brain from infant to adult and genetic and evolutionary changes over many generations.
Typical brain function
This section covers typical brain function as opposed to atypical function discussed below.
Sensory input
Integration
Affect
Mind / body
- Philosophy of mind
- Body integrity identity disorder – when an individual feels they would be happier living as an amputee
- Phantom limb – when an individual has had a limb removed from the body but still receives sensory input from it
Memory
- Methods used to study memory – cumulation of evidence from human, animal, and developmental research in order to make broad theories about how memory works
- Chunking
- Object permanence
- Memory and aging
- Exceptional memory
- Muscle memory – the retention in the brain of memories of certain muscle movements, often enabling those specific movement to be duplicated in the future
- False memory
- Choice-supportive bias – the tendency to retroactively ascribe positive attributes to an option one has selected
- Fundamental attribution error – the tendency to overestimate the effect of disposition or personality and underestimate the effect of the situation in explaining social behavior
- Actor–observer asymmetry – discrepancy between attributions for one's own behavior and for that of others
- Reconstructive memory – theory that the act of remembering is influenced by various other cognitive processes including perception, imagination, semantic memory and beliefs
- Confabulation – a memory disturbance characterized by verbal statements or actions that inaccurately describe history, background, and present situations
- List of memory biases
Integration and cognition
- Sleep
- Neuroscience of sleep – the study of the neuroscientific and physiological basis of the nature of sleep and its functions
- Sleep and memory – memory processes have been shown to be stabilized and sped up by sleep. Certain sleep stages are noted to improve an individual's memory.
- Microsleep – an episode of sleep lasting from fraction of a second to thirty seconds
- Dreaming
- Abstraction – a process by which concepts are derived from the usage and classification of literal concepts
- Imagination – the ability to form new images and sensations that are not perceived through sight, hearing, or other senses
- Wakefulness
- Attention
- Mindfulness
Logic, computation, and information aspects
Executive function
- Supervisory attentional system – higher level system involved with elements of planning, inhibition, and abstraction of logical rules
- Metastability in the brain – the ability to make sense out of seemingly random environmental cues
- Neuroscience of free will – some actions are initiated and processed unconsciously at first, and only consciousnessly afterward
- Neuroeconomics – studying human decision making using techniques from neuroscience, psychology, and economics
- Neurophilosophy – exploration of the relevance of neuroscientific studies to the arguments traditionally categorized as philosophy of mind
- Neural basis of self – using modern concepts of neuroscience to describe a human's perception of self-understanding
- Mentalism (psychology) – branches of study that concentrate on mental perception and thought processes
- Animal cognition
- Lying
- Lie detection – questioning techniques and technologies to discern truth from falsehood
Motor output and behavior
- Motor skill – a learned sequence of movements that combine to produce a smooth, efficient action to master a particular task
- Muscle memory – the retention in the brain of memories of certain muscle movements, often enabling those specific movement to be duplicated in the future
- Behavioral neuroscience
Sexuality, sex differences, and gender differences
Higher level functioning
Atypical brain function
This section covers the major known deviations from typical brain functioning with an emphasis on the resulting magnitude of overall human suffering.
- Neurodegeneration – progressive loss of structure or function of neurons, including death of neurons
- Multiple sclerosis – inflammatory disease in which the myelin sheaths around the axons of the brain and spinal cord are damaged.
- Parkinson's disease – disease causing shaking, rigidity, slowness of movement and difficulty with walking and gait, followed by cognitive and behavioral problems and dementia
- Alzheimer's disease – the most common form of dementia, causing memory loss
- Huntington's disease – mutation in the huntingtin gene causing abnormal involuntary writhing movements, cognitive decline and psychiatric problems
- Dementia – abnormal loss of global cognitive ability in a previously unimpaired person
- Brain cancer
- Brain metastasis – cancer that has spread to the brain from another location in the body
- Tuberous sclerosis – genetic disease that causes non-malignant tumors to grow in the brain and on other vital organs
- Brain damage
- Drug
- Gambler's fallacy – a cognitive bias and fallacy that arises out the erroneous belief that small samples must be representative of the larger population
- Mental disorder
- Acalculia – decrease in cognitive capacity for calculation resulting from damage to the brain
- CCK-4 – compound that reliably causes severe anxiety symptoms when administered to humans, commonly used in scientific research to induce panic attacks
- Thalamocortical radiations – fibers between the thalamus and the cerebral cortex, associated with activity which causes symptoms associated with impulse control disorders, Parkinson's disease, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and other forms of chronic psychosis
- Treatment of mental disorders – treatments frequently mentioning brain dysfunction
- Epileptic seizure – transient symptom of abnormal excessive or hypersynchronous neuronal activity in the brain
Physical interventions
This section covers attempts to physically alter the brain state to relieve suffering, address atypical functioning or improve performance.
- Neurosurgery – surgery to the brain
- Specific procedures:
- Specific regions frequently requiring surgery:
- Conditions frequently treated with surgery:
- Radiation therapy
- Stereotactic radiosurgery – multiple radiation beams converging at a tumor
- Chemotherapy – the use of drugs to kill or alter cancer cells
- Electrotherapy
- Cortical stimulation mapping – direct electrical stimulation of the cerebral cortex to elicit a response
- Electroconvulsive therapy – psychiatric treatment in which seizures are electrically induced in anesthetized patients for potential therapeutic effect
- Neurobiological effects of physical exercise
Other
Case histories
See also
External links
