JHU BME 580.422 Biological Systems II

Neuroanatomy

Reza Shadmehr

Homeworks: There will be 12 problem sets. They will count as 10% of your grade. Students are encouraged to discuss the problems with one another, but each student is responsible to perform the calculations and write the solutions by him/herself. Homeworks are assigned each Friday and they are due the following Friday before 12 noon in Clark Hall 318. A late homework will receive a zero.

Quizzes: There will be 6 quizzes. We will automatically drop the lowest quiz score. The five highest quiz scores will contribute 90% of your grade. Each quiz will cover six lectures and two homeworks.

Bi-weekly quizzes will take place during recitations. If for health reasons you happen to miss a quiz, a written note from a physician or nurse is required. The written note must be provided to the TAs with in two days after the quiz. Quizzes that are missed without a written note automatically receive a zero. The missed quiz can only be made up with an oral exam with the professors.

Office Hours: Clark HallTuesday, 12-2 PMWednesday, 1:30-4 PM

Homework policy

Much of what you will learn in this course will be through doing your homework. I expect you to do your homework without copying from other students.

You are encouraged to form groups to study the material and to work on homework problems. However, any work that you hand in must be your own. This means that even if you figured out how to do the problem with the help of others, you must then write up your homework on your own. If you worked with others, acknowledge at the top of your paper all the people with whom you worked.

Homework solutions: Solutions to the homework are generally posted the morning after the day the homework is due.

Turning in the homework: Make a copy of your homework before you turn it in. If the homework involves programming, you will email one of your TAs your code before class time as well as turn in printed results before 12 noon at Clark Hall 318.

Late homework: Receive a zero.

Academic Integrity for Programming Assignments

Students naturally want to work together, and it is clear they learn a great deal by doing so. Getting help is often the best way to interpret error messages and find bugs, even for experienced programmers. In response to this, the following rules will be in force for programming assignments:

• Students are allowed to work together in designing algorithms, in interpreting error messages, and in discussing strategies for finding bugs, but NOT in writing code.

• Students may not share code, may not copy code, and may not discuss code in detail (line-by-line or loop-by-loop) while it is being written or afterwards.

• Similarly, students may not receive detailed help on their code from individuals outside the course. This restriction includes tutors.

• Students may not show their code to other students as a means of helping them. Sometimes good students who feel sorry for struggling students are tempted to provide them with “just a peek” at their code. Such “peeks” often turn into extensive copying, despite prior claims of good intentions.

We will check assignments very carefully, and make my judgment about which students violated the rules of academic integrity on programming assignments. When I believe an incident of academic dishonesty has occurred, I contact the students involved. Students caught cheating on programming assignments will be punished. The standard punishment for the first offense is a 0 on the assignment and a 5 percentage point penalty on the semester average. Students whose violations are more flagrant will receive a higher penalty. For example, a student who outright steals another student’s code will receive an F in the course immediately. Students caught a second time will receive an immediate F, regardless of circumstances. Each incident will be reported to the Dean of Students’ office.

Goal: To explain behavior in terms of neural activities in the brain.

How do the millions of nerve cells collectively act to produce behavior?

How does our behavior and the environment change the nerve cells?

Are particular mental functions localized to a region of the brain?

If so, how does the anatomy and physiology of one region relate to the specific actions and behaviors that we have?

The central nervous system is divided into seven parts:

1. The spinal cord. Receives and processes sensory information from skin and muscles; sends commands to muscles; houses simple reflexes and controls locomotion.

2. Medulla. Autonomic function: digestion, breathing, heart rate. Sleep function: maintaining quiet.

3. Pons. Control of posture and balance.

4. Cerebellum. Learning, memory, and control of movement.

Kandel et al. (2000) Principles of Neural Science

5. Midbrain. Eye movements.

6. Diencephalon:

• Thalamus. Nearly all sensory information arrives here first.

• Hypothalamus. Regulates autonomic and endocrine function.

7. Cerebral hemispheres.

• Hippocampus. Memory of facts, events, places, faces, etc.

• Basal ganglia. Control of movement.

• Amygdala. Autonomic and endocrine response in emotional states.

• Cerebral cortex.Kandel et al. (2000) Principles of Neural Science

Cerebral cortex:

• Frontal lobe: Planning of action and control of movement.

• Temporal lobe: Hearing, and vision for perception (what is this object that I am looking at?). In its deep structures lies the hippocampus, an important location for memory.

• Occipital lobe. Vision.

• Parietal lobe. Sense of position, and vision for action (where is this object with respect to my body?)

Sulci and Gyri

The surface of the brain develops crevasses and humps as it grows. Each crevasse is called a sulcus. Each hump is called a gyrus. 25 weeks after conception, our brain is fairly smooth. Within 40 weeks get deeper sulci and higher gyri.

axons pull densely connected brain areas together to form gyri

less dense connections result in sulci

R. Carter (1998) Mapping the Mind

(axial plane)

R.B. Graham (1990) Physiological Psychology

dorsal

rostral caudal

R.B. Graham (1990) Physiological Psychology

Coarse Structure of the Brain: Lateral View

Coarse Structure of the Brain: Medial View

Coarse Structure of the Brain: Ventral View

Which is more Caudal? Which is more dorsal?

thalamus

hippocampus

pons

cerebellum

Back ofCorpus callosum

Third ventricle

More caudal

Centralsulcus

Corpuscallosum

Centralsulcus

Lateralventricle

More dorsal

amygdala

temporal lobe

hippocampus

putamen

caudate

hippocampus

fornix (major output pathway from the hippocampus)

thalamus

hypothalamus

midbrain

pons

lateral geniculate nucleus

cerebellar cortex

Nolte & Angevine 2000

lateral ventricle

anterior commissure

anteriorbody

inferior

posterior

atrium

third ventricle

caudate nucleus

headbody

tail

Nolte & Angevine 2000

Nolte & Angevine 2000

internal capsule

putamencaudate

putamen

Nolte & Angevine 2000

cortical white matter cerebral cortex(1.5 to 4.5 mm thick)