CNS

• Basal ganglia - involved in the control of voluntary movements, learning, and habit formation. It is one of the gray matter regions in the brain
• Parkinson's is an issue in the Basal Ganglia, where the neurons in the basal ganglia are damaged. Patients exhibit a lack of motor control
• people with Parkinson's disease have low dopamine, so to compensate they are given L-dopamine (precursor of dopamine)
• Hypothalamus deals with homeostasis
• The lobes of the cerebral cortex are the frontal, parietal, occipital, and temporal lobes
• The frontal lobe has the motor and prefrontal cortex. The motor deals with voluntary movement (controls skeletal muscle) and the prefrontal cortex deals with planning and decision making
• Lobotomy effects the frontal lobe in which it causes dramatic changes like mood swings, aggression, and confusion
• the parietal lobe deals with sensory. The neuron proportion is different across the body (homunculus).
• the occipital lobe deals with vision
• the temporal lobe deals with hearing and memory
• the corpus callosum connects both hemispheres together
• the limbic system includes the hippocampus, amygdala, hypothalamus, cingulate gyrus, and septum.
• the basal ganglia is involved in coordination of movements and learning new skills.
• The occipital denotes that the left brain deals with reasoning and language while the right brain deals with creativity (also emotion).
• The cerebellum coordinates voluntary movement and balance. and can be influenced by alcohol
• The medulla oblongata (apart of the brain stem) controls vital functions such as breathing, heart rate, blood pressure, swallowing, vomiting, sneezing, coughing, and digestion.
• There are more neurons in the fingers and face than other parts of the body as seen by the Homunculus
• Phineas P. Gage was an individual with a large hole in his prefrontal cortex. He lived for a long time yet made poor decisions after his accident as the prefrontal cortex was damaged
• The hippocampus is important for memory formation and learning
• The amygdala is a structure in the limbic system that plays a role in emotional responses and memory
• cingulate gyrus plays a role in emotion
• The limbic system is the emotional center of the brain and is responsible for emotions, memory, and learning. It is comprised of the amygdala, hippocampus, and cingulate gyrus. It is apart of gray matter in the cerebrum
• Short term memory is turned into long term memory when it is processed (consolidated). The two forms of memories are then recalled and lead to an output
• In patients with depression their REM portion of sleep comes much earlier than normal
• The deepest form of sleep occurs in first 3 hours
• stage four sleep is characterized by slow wave sleep in form of delta waves
• when alpha waves are present, the individual is awake but their eyes are closed
• two types of long term memory are reflective (implicit) and declarative (explicit)
• implicit memory is acquired through slowly through repetition and recall does not require conscious attention
• explicit memory is requires conscious attention and depends on high level thinking skills (like evaluation and inference)