THE BRAIN

By Grecia Angelica
The brain is the center of the nervous
system in all vertebrate and most
invertebrate animals. Some primitive
animals such as jellyfish and starfish
have a decentralized nervous system
without a brain, while sponges lack
any nervous system at all. In
vertebrates the brain is located in the
head, protected by the skull and close
to the primary sensory apparatus of
vision, hearing, balance, taste, and
smell.
HUMAN BRAIN SHARK BRAIN
Brains can be extremely complex. The cerebral cortex of
the human brain contains roughly 15–33 billion neurons,
perhaps more, depending on gender and age, linked with
up to 10,000 synaptic connections each. Each cubic
millimeter of cerebral cortex contains roughly one billion
synapses. These neurons communicate with one another
by means of long protoplasmic fibers called axons, which
carry trains of signal pulses called action potentials to
distant parts of the brain or body and target them to
specific recipient cells.

Structure of a typical chemical synapse

In spite of the fact that it is protected by
the thick bones of the skull, suspended in
cerebrospinal fluid, and isolated from the
bloodstream by the blood-brain barrier, the
delicate nature of the human brain makes it
susceptible to many types of damage and
disease. The most common forms of
physical damage are closed head injuries
such as a blow to the head, a stroke, or
poisoning by a wide variety of chemicals
that can act as neurotoxins. Infection of the
brain is rare because of the barriers that
protect it, but is very serious when it
occurs. The human brain is also susceptible
to degenerative disorders, such as
Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, and
Alzheimer's disease. A number of
psychiatric conditions, such as
Cortical divisions
Four lobes
Outwardly, the cerebral cortex is nearly symmetrical, with left
and right hemispheres. Anatomists conventionally divide each
hemisphere into four "lobes", the:
Frontal lobe
Parietal lobe
Occipital lobe
Temporal lobe

This categorization does not actually arise from the structure

of the cortex itself: the lobes are named after the bones of
the skull that overlie them. There is one exception: the border
between the frontal and parietal lobes is shifted backward to
the central sulcus, a deep fold that marks the line where the
primary somatosensory cortex and primary motor cortex
come together.
Although the division of the cortex into hemispheres and
lobes is very general and perhaps lack the precision of
specifying by brain coordinates (e.g. Talairach space) or
through the region of specific brain cytoarchitecture (e.g.
Brodmann areas, or deep brain structures), it is nevertheless
useful for discussing general brain anatomy or the locating
the lesions in a general area of the brain.
Each hemisphere of the brain
interacts primarily with one half of
the body, but for reasons that are
unclear, the connections are crossed:
the left side of the brain interacts Lateralization of brain
with the right side of the body, and
vice versa.[Motor connections from function
the brain to the spinal cord, and
sensory connections from the spinal
cord to the brain, both cross the
midline at brainstem levels. Visual
input follows a more complex rule:
the optic nerves from the two eyes
come together at a point called the
optic chiasm, and half of the fibers
from each nerve split off to join the
other. The result is that connections
from the left half of the retina, in
both eyes, go to the left side of the
brain, whereas connections from the
right half of the retina go to the right
side of the brain. Because each half
of the retina receives light coming
from the opposite half of the visual
field, the functional consequence is
that visual input from the left side of
the world goes to the right side of the
brain, and vice versa. Thus, the right
side of the brain receives
Instituto Tecnológico de Educación
Avanzada
Teacher: Justin Bieber
Team: Hugo, Paco, Luis, Grecia

December 2010