Questions tagged [neuroscience]
The study of the structure and function of the nervous system and its components.
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Schematic of neural lineage tree and position of Choroid Plexus cells
I am trying to understand which are the different type of progenitors in the human brain and I am currently following this schematic.
My question is, are Choroid Plexus cells progenitors to Radial ...
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Breakdown of functional human genome by organ/What fraction of the functional human genome is devoted specifically to brain functioning?
Of course, there won't be a precise known answer to the question, as it is not even known precisely what percentage of the genome is functional in the first place - but I am still looking for research....
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Understanding the ECG waveform with respect to Lead Positions
I am really confused about the Representation of potential in an ECG graph.
First i will ask what is on the vertical axis? (I guess it is electrical potential in millivolts)
But again it changes for ...
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How do defibrillators work? [duplicate]
I've heard that defibrillators apply a certain voltage difference to the cardiac region and this temporarily inhibits the pacemaker.
Can anyone please explain me how it works with respect to what ...
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What is the function of dreaming? Does a particular hormone secretion interfere with dreaming? Why do some people dream more?
I'm really interested to know when we are sleeping how a series of stories come to our mind that we called this process dreaming. If you know a useful article on this topic, please tell me thanks.
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Why do biologists judge intellect based on brain size?
I have seen many times, that scientists will say Species A is smarter than Species B due to a higher brain-to-body ratio. I've even seen similar arguments made by comparing the sizes of specific ...
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24 views
Has anyone attempted to add extra senses to a creature through a BCI/Neural interface?
Basic BCI's (Brain computer interfaces) have been available for quite a while now and allow users to preform rudimentary tasks such as moving prosthetic limbs with force-feedback or moving a mouse on ...
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1answer
36 views
What does microglia process length tell us?
I'm reading a study investigating traumatic brain injury and alcohol consumption and the researchers measured microglia process length as an indicator of brain damage. I was wondering what that would ...
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Inhibitory functional connectivity
Functional connectivity may be defined as
»the temporal correlation between spatially remote neurophysiological events, expressed as deviation from statistical independence across these events in ...
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Is relative timing of signal transmission between neurons along axons and through synapses relevant in the brain?
A neuron may be part of a nerve connection between two endpoints, transferring a signal that is not very sensitive to variations in signal propagation speed.
But a neuron inside a cluster of ...
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Long-term potentiations that last for a lifetime
One reads more often than not that
long-term potentiation has been reported to last for as long as several weeks
LTP is persistent, lasting from several minutes to many months
and most sources seem ...
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54 views
Ion-gated ion channels
Today I've heard for the first time of calcium-gated ion channels but find it hard to get an idea how they work, where they are located, and which role they play.
I assume calcium-gated ion channels ...
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Differences between neurotransmitters and neuromodulators
According to the Wikipedia article on neuromodulation
a neuromodulator can be conceptualized as a neurotransmitter that is
not reabsorbed by the pre-synaptic neuron or broken down into a
...
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Typical firing patterns of neurons in the default mode network in resting state
Inspired by the Wikipedia article on the default mode network where I read:
Hans Berger, the inventor of the electroencephalogram, was the first
to propose the idea that the brain is constantly ...
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Functional roles of firing patterns
Eugene Izhikevich reports – e.g. here – a plethora of neural firing patterns:
My question is two-fold:
Is there an overview which types of neurons are capable of (and typically exhibit) ...
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1answer
77 views
Parts of the brain pivotal for maintaining consciousness
From an answer to another question (on conscious experiences by coma patients) I have learned that
no conscious experiences, complex thoughts, or complex emotions can
occur when one is in coma (...
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1answer
109 views
How does the dopamine spike from drugs compare quantitatively to pleasurable non-drug activities?
I did find this popular press article that quotes a researcher offering the following quantification: "in lab experiments done on animals, sex causes dopamine levels to jump from 100 to 200 units, and ...
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What are the disadvantages of myelin
The myelination of axons has plenty of advantages. It increases signal speed in axons, and thereby reduces reaction times. This is, of course, very good for the survival of the animal in question.
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What is the meaning of depth relation and EM in this excerpt?
In the excerpt below from Morphology of Invertebrate Neurons and Synapses
For the better part of a century, conclusions were made largely by matching the depth relations between the terminals of ...
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Neuron stimulation experiments
Has anyone extracted a class of neurons (or a connected set of neurons) and stimulated them electrically to get an understanding of their behavior?
If so, could someone point me to papers along these ...
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1answer
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Vision: what is the difference between on-off ganglion cells and lateral inhibition?
Is 'lateral inhibition' just a term for the biological basis of the functioning of the on-center (or off-center) ganglion cells?
Or do these terms describe separate processes?
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42 views
To what extent does loss of neurons in the substantia nigra affect movement?
There is a substance known as MPTP that is capable of crossing the blood-brain barrier. Once it does so, it is metabolized into a toxin called MPP+, which then selectively destroys dopaminergic ...
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Can brain activity be restored after being stopped, assuming no cellular damage?
I was reading about cryonic preservation recently. In a separate place on the Internet, I've read that once brain activity stops and brain death occurs, the person is dead with no hope of recovery. ...
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Factors behind frequency of action potential
I understand that the amplitude of an action potential is not influenced by the strength of the stimulus. I also understand that the perception of the strength of the stimulus depends on the frequency ...
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Functional unit
What is meant by functional unit of a system?
like when we say that the neuron is the basic unit of neural system do we mean that all those things that are performed by neural system can be performed ...
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Why didn't the human Cerebrum evolve to have granule cells like the Cerebellum does?
The Cerebellum is much smaller compared to the Cerebrum yet it contains more than half of the total neurons contained in the brain.
That's mainly due to the granule cells in the Cerebellum which ...
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Does the cranial dura consist of the periosteum? and if not, then is there a mistake in my textbook?
My textbook (Neuroanatomy an illustrated colour text) states that:
The spinal dura and much of the cranial dura are separate from the periosteum, which forms the inner lining of the surrounding ...
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Can IPSPs produce an action potential?
This picture was taken from Purves' Neuroscience, chapter 5:
Image (C) shows a inhibitory postsynaptic potential whose reversal potential "goes" to the action potential. If two or more IPSPs occur, ...
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135 views
How fast do we fall asleep?
When looking at the process of sleeping, most research I find point to a group of mutually inhibitory cells which form a sort of biological "flip flop." There's cells that promote awakenness and ...
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What are the chemicals in the gap at a synapse? [duplicate]
I am learning about (introductory level) biological psychology and the synapse structure came into mind. I do understand that neurotransmitters are transmitted between two neurons via the synapse ...
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1answer
58 views
Why/how does exposure to noise cause cochlear hair-cell loss?
I am trying to understand why listening to loud music - e.g. concerts or earphones at high volume damages hearing.
According to the National Institute on Deafness the cause is physical.
Most ...
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22 views
What is the purpose of descending auditory signals from the brain?
What might the purpose be of the brain having descending auditory signals from the brain? My textbook is very vague about this and I am just curious.
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What are the advantages of bidirectional signalling in electrical synapses?
Electrical synapses are known for being very fast at communicating with other neurons. (1)
What I often see in articles about electrical synapses is that they are bidirectional.(1) This is seen as a ...
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Is sexual desire stronger in men than women?
Usually in popular culture it's considered men sexual desire is stronger than women. This seems to be congruent with the availability of sexual related items for men and women, such as magazines, ...
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Why is there no solid evidence (histological, fMRI) that the vestibular hair cells of the inner ear contribute to 53% of the respiratory drive?
There are these papers which strongly imply that the inner ear hair cells, and not the medulla, is primarily the driving factor in the CO2 drive reflex
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21130842
...
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1answer
26 views
What determines the influx of calcium ions in the voltage-gated ion channels?
Calcium channels play a crucial role in neuronal signaling by helping the synaptic vesicles to fuse through the synaptic active zone and release their neurotransmitters. My question is, at a given ...
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1answer
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What happens when the conductance of a sodium channel increases?
My intuition is that, since the concentration of sodium within a cell is higher than the extracellular concentration, when conductance increases, this corresponds to the channel being open and means ...
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2answers
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Are neurotransmitters part of the endocrine system?
I was speaking with a substitute teacher of mine, and we were discussing whether neurotransmitters are part of the endocrine system or not. My class just spent an entire semester on the topic of the ...
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1answer
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What causes sodium channels to open?
What triggers the opening of sodium channels in a neuronal membrane? Is it acetylcholine that activates sodium channels in the postsynaptic membrane?
Are sodium channels like receptors that have to ...
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What makes learning more difficult as we age?
Why is it harder to adapt yourself to different cultures, places, and languages as you age? What makes breaking up with emotional patterns or ideas after years of habit more difficult?
Is there a ...
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Do astrocytes connect and chemically communicate with other astrocytes?
I am building a novel model of neural tissue for the purposes of Machine Learning and am currently trying to unpick the functions of the astroglia.
The literature suggests that astrocytes ensheath ...
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A question about how the brain determines the source of a sound
If a person's eardrum vibrates, let's say, 440 times per second for 1 second, how does the brain know its because 1 sound source vibrated 440 times, as opposed to 440 sources vibrating once, one after ...
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Looking for books on How the limbic system works and it role in non-verbal behavior
This is my first post. I just read and I'm currently studying a book called "How everybody works" as a guide to understanding nonverbal behaviors.
After I'm done studying it and while I experiment ...
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Is there a minimum amount a muscle can move? And thus, gaps in our movement?
Lately I've been thinking about something, based on my knowledge my chain of reasoning works like this...
When you want to move a muscle your brain sends an electrical nervous impulse along the chain ...
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What makes synapses stay “fixed”?
What makes synapses not move or pre- and postsynaptic cells neither touch nor move away from each other? I mean the synaptic cleft is a gap between the pre- and postsynaptic cells that is about 20 nm ...
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can auditory/ocular reflexes exist?
In the same way the knee-jerk reflex is a thing (I think the nerve signal doesn't go through the brain?), can stimuli received by the eyes or ears trigger "instantaneous" (faster than the brain can ...
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Can we “learn” reflexes?
Can we force our bodies to react to situations faster than our brain can think about them?
Some reflexes I can think of off the top of my head:
knee jerk reflex
retracting hand when touching a hot ...
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1answer
52 views
How do we know if a neuron is inhibitory or excitatory?
The textbook examples for an excitatory neurotransmitter is Glutamate, and for an inhibitory neurotransmitter it is GABA.
In my naive understanding, a neuron was inhibitory or excitatory depending on ...
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1answer
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What makes synaptic vesicle release probabilistic?
The fusion of synaptic vesicles (SVs) with the plasma membrane of the active zone (AZ) upon arrival of an action potential (AP) at the presynaptic compartment is a tightly regulated probabilistic ...
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Could we have endless pleasure?
Are there any studies that point out that we could have a device in the future or drug that could give us endless amount of pleasure by stimulating or blocking processes in the brain or nerve system? ...
