Neuroscience
Neuroscience is a
scientific discipline that studies the
structure, function,
development,
genetics,
biochemistry,
physiology,
pharmacology, and
pathology of the
nervous system. Traditionally it is seen as a branch of
biological sciences. However, recently there has been of convergence of interest from many allied disciplines, including
psychology,
computer science,
statistics,
physics, and
medicine. The scope of neuroscience has now broadened to include any systematic scientific experimental and theoretical investigation of the central and peripheral nervous system of biological organisms. The methodologies employed by
neuroscientists have been enormously expanded, from biochemical and genetic analysis of dynamics of individual
nerve cells and their molecular constituents to
imaging representations of perceptual and motor tasks in the brain.
Furthermore, neuroscience is at the frontier of investigation of the brain and mind. The study of the brain is becoming the cornerstone in understand how we perceive and interact with the external world and, in particular, how human experience and human biology influence each other. It is likely that the study of the brain will become the central intellectual endeavor in the coming decades.
The
scientific study of the
nervous systems has exploded in the second half of the twentieth century, principally due to revolutions in
molecular biology and in
digital computation. It has become possible to understand, in exquisite detail, the complex processes occuring inside a single
neuron. The next and much more challenging step is to make sense of these processes in understanding behavior.
The nervous system is composed of
nervous cells, each with a complete copy of the organism's
genome. Some of the basic questions in neuroscience, in particular
molecular neuroscience include the mechanisms by which neurons express and respond to molecular signals and how
axons form complex connectivity patterns. At this level, tools from
molecular biology and
genetics are used to understand how neurons are born and die, and how genetic changes affect biological function. The
morphology, molecular identity and physiological characteristics of neurons and how they relate to different types of behavior are also of considerable interest. Finally the ways in which neurons and their connections are modified by experience remains a central question of neuroscience.
Neurons form functional circuits, each responsible for specific tasks. These circuits can be studied anatomically and physiologically. Research in
systems neuroscience attempts to understand how these circuits function and the mechanisms through which they generate behavior. Systems level analysis also addresses questions concerning specific sensory and motor modalities: how does
vision work? How do
songbirds learn new songs and
bats localize with
ultrasound? The related field of
neuroethology, in particular, addresses the complex question of how neural substrates underlies specific animal behavior.
|
a movie of MRI sections through the Z-axis in a normal human adult |
At the highest level,
cognitive neuroscience is becoming a dynamic field of its own. With the emergence of powerful experimental techniques such as
fMRI,
eletrophysiology and
human genetic analysis, neuroscience is now beginning to address questions unique in human congition and emotion. Many mental processes previously thought to be beyond scientific understanding have been shown to have robust neural correlates. Neuroscience is also beginning to become allied with
social sciences, and burgeoning interdiciplinary fields of
neuroeconomics,
decision theory,
social neuroscience are starting to address some of the most complex questions involving interactions of brain with environment.
Neuroscience generally includes all scientific studies involving the nervous system.
Psychology, as the scientific study of mental processes, may be considered a sub-field of neuroscience, although some mind/body theorists argue that the definition goes the other way. The term
neurobiology is often used interchangably with
neuroscience, though the former refers more commonly to the
biology of
nervous system and
molecular neuroscience.
Neurology and
Psychiatry are medical specialties and are generally considered, in academic research, subfields of neuroscience that specifically address the diseases of the nervous system. These terms also refer to clinical diciplines involving diagnosis and treatment of theses diseases. Neurology deals with diseases of the central and peripheral nervous systems such as
ALS and
stroke, while psychiatry focuses on
mental illnesses. The boundaries between the two have been blurring recently and physicians who specialize in either generally receive training in both. Both neurology and psychiatry are heavily involved in and influenced by basic research in neuroscience.
Current neuroscience research activities can be very roughly categorized into the following major branches, based on the subject and scale of the system in examination as well as distinct experimental approaches. Individual neuroscientists, however, often work on questions that expand several distinct subfields.
| Experimental and Theoretical Methods | | Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience | behavioral genetics, neurocytology, Glia, Protein trafficking, Ion channel, Synapse, Action potential, Neurotransmitters, Neuroimmunology | PCR, Immunohistochemistry, Patch clamp, voltage clamp, molecular cloning, gene knockout, biochemical assays, linkage analysis, fluorescent in situ hybridization, southern blots, DNA microarray, GFP, calcium imaging, two-photon microscopy |
| Systems Neuroscience | The Primary Visual Cortex, Perception, Audition, Sensory Integration, Population Coding, Pain,Spontaneous and Evoked Activity, Color vision, olfaction,taste,motor system,spinal cord, sleep, homeostasis, arousal, attention | single unit recording, intrinsic signal imaging, microstimulation, voltage sensitive dyes, fMRI, patch clamp, genomics, training awake behaving animals, local field potentials, ROC, cortical cooling, calcium imaging, two-photon microscopy |
| Developmental Neuroscience | axon guidance,neural crest,growth factors,growth cone,neuromuscular junction,cell proliferation,neuronal differentiation, cell survival and apoptosis, snaptic formation, motor differentiation, injury and regeneration | xenopus oocyte, protein chemistry, genomics,drosophila,Hox gene |
| Cognitive Neuroscience | language,emotion, motor learning,sexual behavior,decision making,behavioral genetics,motivation,social neuroscience | psychometrics,EEG,MEG,fMRI,PET,SPECT,single unit recording,human genetics |
| Computational and Theoretical Neuroscience | cable theory,hodgkin-huxley model,neuronal networks,voltage-gated currents,Hebbian learning | markov chain monte carlo,simulated annealing,high performance computing,partial differential equations,self-organizing nets,pattern recognition |
| Neuroscience of Diseases and Aging | dementia,peripherial neuropathy,spinal cord injury,autonomic systems,depression,anxiety,Parkinson's,Addiction,memory loss | clinical trials,neuropharmacology,deep brain stimulation,neurosurgery |
Neuroscience research from different areas can also be seen as focusing on a set of specific themes and questions.
* Neurobiology of the neuron
* Learning and memory
* Sensation and perception
* Sleep
* Autonomic systems and homeostasis
* Arousal, attention and emotion
* Genetics of the nervous system
* Injury of the nervous systems
* Computation
Neuroscience, by its very interdiciplinary nature, overlaps with and emcompasses many different subjects. Bellow is a list of related subjects and fields.
*
Aphasiology*
Behavioral Neuroscience*
Machine Learning*
Neural Networks*
Evolutionary neuroscience*
Neural engineering*
Neuroanatomy*
Neurobiology*
Neurochemistry*
Neuroeconomics*
Neuroergonomics*
Neuroendocrinology*
Neuroesthetics*
Neuroethics*
Neuroethology*
Neurogenetics*
Neurogenomics*
Neuroheuristic*
Neuroimaging*
Neurolinguistics*
Neuromarketing*
Neuropharmacology*
Neurophenomenology*
Neurophilosophy*
Neurophysiology*
Neuroproteomics*
Neuroprosthetics*
Neuropsychiatry*
Neuropsychology*
Neuropsychopharmacology*
Neurotheology (also Biotheology)
*
Psychiatry*
Psychopharmacology*
Psychobiology (also Biopsychology, also
Biological psychology)
*
VisionEarly views on the function of the
brain, regarded it to be a form of "cranial stuffing" of sorts. In Egypt, from the late
Middle Kingdom onwards, in preparation for mummification, the brain was regularly removed, for it was the
heart that was assumed to be the seat of intelligence. According to
Herodotus, during the first step of mummification: ‘The most perfect practice is to extract as much of the brain as possible with an iron hook, and what the hook cannot reach is mixed with drugs.' Over the next two thousand years, this view came to be reversed; the brain is now known to be seat of intelligence, although colloquial variations of the former remain as in "memorizing something by heart".
Its own separate article?
*
Applied Neuroscience, Austria*
Unsolved problems in neuroscience*
List of neuroscience topics*
Important publications in neuroscience*
List of neuroscientists*
:Category:Neuroscientists*
:Category:Psychology*
:Category:Biology*
Wikibook on consciousnessTextbooks
*Squire, L. et al. (2003).
Fundamental Neuroscience, 2nd edition. Academic Press; ISBN 0126603030
*Byrne and Roberts (2004).
From Molecules to Networks. Academic Press; ISBN 0121486605
*Sanes, Reh, Harris (2005).
Development of the Nervous System, 2nd edition. Academic Press; ISBN 0126186219
*Siegel et al. (2005).
Basic Neurochemistry, 7th edition. Academic Press; ISBN 012088397X
*Rieke, F. et. al. (1999).
Spikes: Exploring the Neural Code.
The MIT Press; Reprint edition ISBN 0262681080
Online textbooks
*
Neuroscience 2nd ed. Dale Purves, George J. Augustine, David Fitzpatrick, Lawrence C. Katz, Anthony-Samuel LaMantia, James O. McNamara, S. Mark Williams. Published by Sinauer Associates, Inc., 2001.
*
Basic Neurochemistry: Molecular, Cellular, and Medical Aspects 6th ed. by George J. Siegel, Bernard W. Agranoff, R. Wayne Albers, Stephen K. Fisher, Michael D. Uhler, editors. Published by Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins, 1999.
Popular works
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