L1.2.1.1.1.1: 3 Main Regions

• 3 MAIN REGIONS OF CEREBRAL HEMISPHERE

  ● Cerebral Cortex

  ● Cerebral White Matter

  ● Basal Nuclei / Ganglia
• ● Cerebral Cortex

  ○ The superficial gray matter (when preserved in formalin)

  ○ Controls voluntary and skilled skeletal muscle activity

  ○ Acts in intellectual and emotional processing
• ● Cerebral Cortex

  ○ FUNCTIONS

  ■ Speech

  ■ Memory

  ■ Logical and emotional responses

  ■ Consciousness

  ■ Interpretation of sensation

  ■ Voluntary movement
• ● Cerebral White Matter

  ○ Composed of fiber tracts deep to the gray matter that carry impulses to, from, or within the cortex

  ○ Corpus Callosum - the largest set of commissural fibers
• ● Cerebral White Matter

  3 types of fiber tracts

  1. Commissural Fibers
  2. Association Fibers
  3. Projection Fibers
• ● Basal Nuclei / Ganglia

  ○ Islands of gray matter buried deep within the white matter of the cerebrum

  ○ Regulate voluntary motor activities by modifying instructions sent to skeletal muscles by the primary motor cortex

  ○ Internal capsule - a tight band of projection fibers that passes between the thalamus and the basal nuclei
• Huntington’s Disease & Parkinson’s Disease

  - Examples of syndromes caused by problems in basal nuclei resulting to being unable to walk normally or carry out voluntary movements in a normal way