Questions tagged [neuroscience]
The study of the structure and function of the nervous system and its components.
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Why don't sodium Voltage Gated Channels open during Repolarization?
During Depolarization the Sodium VGC open when they receive the Threshold Stimulus. But when Repolarization occurs there comes a point when the cell interior has exactly the the same potential that it ...
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How do brain cells produce a charge? [closed]
I'm not entirely sure that electric brain signals are a form of current such as direct or alternating. But what do we mean by electric brain signals, and how are they produced and transmitted (if not ...
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Is the neural area TEO distinct from the inferotemporal cortex?
I am finding conflicting literature with regards to the division of the inferior temporal (IT) cortex of the brain.
For some, I see that area TEO is equivalent to the posterior IT. Which would make ...
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Why are we not forced by our brains to exercise if exercise leads to preservation of life? [duplicate]
I have researched into this topic but not seemed to find anything on why our brains don't force us to exercise or make it a compulsive need even though it preserves our life for longer? I have a ...
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Why is it difficult to compare phosphorylation in proteins and peptides?
In a recent project, I wanted to find out in what way phosphorylation of certain peptides is influenced by a specific environmental cue. So in a published research article I came across a list which ...
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Using coefficient of variation (CV) for GCaMP6 'synchronised episode' spikes, good idea or not?
Using GCaMP6 we have recorded fluorescence activity of kisspeptin neurons that exhibit synchronised pulsatile firing activity. I measured the intervals between each episode, which are quite variable. ...
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Human simulation software for experimenting
Is there any simulation software that imitates the physical and/or functional properties of living cells/organs (Such as neurons, skin, and bone) and that can be used for experimenting? (Such as ...
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1answer
28 views
Are neurons capable of buffering a signal to sync up with other data?
The brain is the most complex thing that mankind discovered thus far in the universe. Super computers aren't able yet to outperform the human brain (running only on ~25 watt or so) on the domain of ...
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43 views
Biological Neural Network Modification to Unlearn Understandings [closed]
Lets assume that a person grows up thinking that religion X is true religion. So he builds up a profile in ones head and when notion of religion X appears the neurons that is related are fired, giving ...
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Do neurons that *don't* fire together unwire?
We all know the classic Hebbian theory, often phrased as "neurons that fire together wire together." I'm curious about how other connections get pruned when two neurons start to fire ...
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Could eidetic memory be related to glial cells?
I am a plasma physicist so I apologize in advance for my biology ignorance.
I recall from a neuropsychology class I took in college (used Lezak, Howieson, and Loring, 4th Edition) that there are ...
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Biological Neural Network Training for Babies [closed]
I am concerned by the fact that babies cant walk because the muscles in their limbs arent developed and tuned to give directional control, it takes years before babies gain mobility and dexterity. So ...
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How does the brain initiate the process of releasing the neurotransmitters?
Just reading up on the basics of neuroscience. Had a basic question on the signal generation. I understand the concepts of sodium, potassium pumps and how the action potential travels through the axon ...
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Parts of Brain Active for Dreams | Right Hemisphere or Cortex
I found a research that states cortex is responsible for the contents of the dream. Contents could be people, place, objects etc.
The cortex is responsible for the content of dreams, including the ...
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1answer
51 views
Can potassium ions depolarise neuron membranes?
I am reading a journal paper about the cell adhesion molecule NCAM2 and I have come across the following statement:
To confirm the functionality of the reporters, neurons were time-lapse
recorded ...
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1answer
55 views
Is new idea equivalent to forming new synaptic connection?
We get new ideas quite frequently hence I am curious that is getting new idea equvant to formation of new synaptic connections? I am aware of neural plasticity but somehow doubt that it happens quite ...
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26 views
How reward / penalty is comprehended?
Technically brain is composed of billions of neurons for abstract computation of the world around us. I am bit confused that how does emotions such as fear/anger gets simulated by amygdala, which is ...
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Does The Sympathetic Nervous System Increase or Decrease Urination?
According to my book:
Sympathetic nervous system stimulation, leads to the release of Norepinephrine(Noradrenaline), priming the body for the "Fight or Flight" response.
It is also stated ...
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What are kinesiological factors? [duplicate]
I am in search of a term that describes movement, or practice of motor skills, as a factor of laterality. Would "kinesiological" be appropriate? I'll leave my two previous questions down ...
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Does GABA enhance or inhibit negative effects of glutamate?
A study on NCBI studied the correlation between a depressive mood and chronic pain. I researched this because today I noticed unusual emotional volatility as a result of 2 days of acute back pain ...
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1answer
38 views
Why proprioceptive fibres (of CN V) have their cell bodies in mesencephalic trigeminal nucleus?
It's seen that GSA (General Somatic Afferent) fibres (of CN V) have their cell bodies in trigeminal ganglion. But the proprioceptive fibres' peripheral processes terminate at mesencephalic trigeminal ...
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1answer
30 views
What is the difference between a dermatome and a sensory neurone?
I read that a dermatome is an area of skin supplied by a single spinal nerve but that this is sensory information? Why do spinal nerves supply the skin? I thought it was the other way round- sensory ...
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1answer
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Do adult mammalian cochlear inner hair cells regenerate?
The consensus seems to be no, but I see conflicting evidence.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5361427/
Supernumerary human hair cellsāsigns of regeneration or impaired development? A ...
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24 views
Is there such a thing as transcranial magnetic inhibition? inhibit regions of the brain?
is there such a thing as transcranial magnetic inhibition?
There is an instrument capable of inhibiting regions of the brain as does transcranial magnetic stimulation, but in reverse?
By inhibiting, I ...
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11 views
Term for context based behavior?
Is there term in neuroscience that describes change in neuronal circuits depending on context: low sugar/fear/... => hormones => different pathways of behavior ...?
I know that is something from ...
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1answer
25 views
Does electrotonic spread/conduction occur in saltatory conduction?
Even as textbooks, and almost all web pages I've seen so far, explain electrotonic spread/conduction as the passive current flow along an axon, they do so with continuous conduction only. Apart from ...
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Is a “Nerve” a cell or a tissue? [closed]
Nervous tissue includes Neurons and Glial cells. Neurons have soma and other projections (neurites) namely Axon and Dendrites. Axon or dendrites of a nerve cell covered with endoneurium
is called ...
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112 views
What percentage of the brain is memory | Storage of thoughts, episodes
I was reading the article, in which it is mentioned that human brain constitutes 2.5 petabytes of memory. This made me wonder how much of the brain is associated with memory itself. If we categorize ...
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20 views
What is the most specific behavior we're able to control or induce with optogenetics?
Optogenetics is very widely used in neuroscience to study how behavior is controlled by populations of neurons. For example, in a highly cited 2011 Nature paper, Lin et al. show that they can induce ...
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Why does increasing the space constant increase conduction velocity in myelinated neurons if nodes of Ranvier are constantly spaced?
If depolarisation at one node of Ranvier triggers, by passive conduction, an action potential at the next node of Ranvier, why does increasing the space constant increase conduction velocity? Surely ...
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1answer
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How can tooth enamel feel pain when drilled by a dentist?
Enamel has no nerves, so theoretically a tooth should not feel any pain when a dentist bores into it. Yet still we use anesthetics...
Maybe itās dentin's fault? It apparently has some tubes filled ...
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2answers
42 views
Has anyone yet figured out how sensory signals for eyes and ears are encoded by our organ into electrical signals? [closed]
The most obvious way to give sight to blind and hearing to deaf is to give them a replacement organ for these. In order to do that we would need to understand how our eyes and ears encode sensory ...
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What type of factor is practice of motor skills?
I recently asked a question about the cause of motor laterality: What causes motor laterality/ side dominance?
I understand that there can be genetic factors, epigenetic factors, or environmental ...
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1answer
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Term for a prey animal's recognition that something potentially threatening is looking at it?
On my daily walks I frequently see individual or small groups of cattle egrets. At first I would try to photograph them but they would fly away. This vexed me because they ignored everyone else ...
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1answer
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Does the corpus callosum have a significant relationship with motor memories/ muscle memories?
With the corpus callosum located in the cerebrum, and motor memories having a closer relationship to the cerebellum (which I'm not quite sure about), is there a significant relationship between the ...
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33 views
What causes motor laterality/ side dominance?
I would like to understand what leads up to motor laterality, or side dominance of motor skills.
I made this assumption that it depends on neuroplasticity and the side in which one first learns the ...
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2answers
73 views
Can below-threshold potential changes of neurons convey information?
In neuroscience we learn that when the membrane potential of a neuron reaches a threshold (typically around -55mV) it "spikes": That is, it actively propagates a signal. I have two related ...
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1answer
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What are “intrinsic hypothalamic fibers”? (From an article on neuronal mechanisms of sexual desire)
I came across the phrase intrinsic hypothalamic fibers which I cannot understand. What is meant by intrinsic - that these fibers (long myelinated axons?) start in the hypothalamus? Or that they start ...
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Phantom Limb | Is that even possible?
I am fascinated by the fact that an amputee can control their robotic arm by thinking of the actions they would normally execute when the limb was present.
The mind sends signals to the nerve endings ...
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Why do we have both on and off bipolar cells?
I have a question regarding the reason behind the 2 bipolar cells.
So, from my understanding we have both on and off bipolar cells and from the numerous diagrams I have seen, I find that most show a ...
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2answers
24 views
Action potential attenuation in unmyelinated axons vs demyelinated axons
I learnt that action potentials travel much faster along myelinated axons, and when these axons are demyelinated the action potentials travel much slower and sometimes die out. Why do action ...
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When assessing a threat, does the amygdala compare the stimulus to memories of the amygdala or the hippocampus?
Two excerpts from the one article.
My understanding of this excerpt is that the amygdala is using its own memories:
The amygdala learns how to respond to various stimuli based on itās reference to ...
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Myelinated vs Un-myelinated
If an axon is completely myelinated (doesn't even have Nodes of Ranvier), is it faster than an un-myelinated axon when conducting action potentials?
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At small axon diameters (<1 µm), why does myelination not increase neuronal conduction velocity?
As per the diagram below (and other graphs available online), why do unmyelinated fibres have a higher conduction velocity than myelinated fibres when the axon diameter is less than around 1 Āµm?
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How do we know that selective agonists are indeed selective?
Suppose we know that compound X is a selective agonist of receptor Y, meaning that it binds only this receptor Y and no other. But how do we know this that it doesn't bind some another receptor? I ...
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Myelination of 1st Order Neurons in Spinal Cord Ascending Tracts
When a 1st order sensory neuron enters the Dorsal Column Ascending Pathway (i.e. Spinal Cord), does it get its myelination from Oligodendrocytes (as inside CNS) or it retains Schwann Cell myelination?
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Alternative hypothesis for learning in brain beyond the hebbian rule
I was reading on wikipedia that there are exceptions to the hebbian rule, and I was curious about the possibilities of other hypotheses of how learning occur in the brain. So I would like to know:
...
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Can we say that the source of the most circulatory regulation in the human is the nervous system?
local regulation of blood flow and Baroreceptors, both stimulate the neurons and send messages to the brain. so can we say that the source of the most circulatory regulation in the human is the ...
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If the Brain can store as much information as a billion hard disks why cant i memorize a single word document of random letters?
I read a lot of articles on this and all seem to agree that the brain storage in neural connections is tremendous but that doesnt explain why we forget things so easily and have such a modest memory ...
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Why are the sympathetic and parasympathetic axons different, in terms of presynaptic and postsynaptic length?
Does the parasympathetic system have a long presynaptic efferent axon because it takes a great distance to reach target organs from the brain stem or sacral region of the spine? Does the sympathetic ...
