Neuroscience

Neuroscience (or neurobiology) is the scientific study of the nervous system. It is the branch of biology which investigates every aspect of the brain and nervous system.

The nervous system is made of billions of neurons connected together and to other systems in the body. The central nervous system includes the brain, spinal cord and retina. It is connected to the rest of the body via the peripheral nervous system.

Research themes

Neuroscience research focusses on a set of themes and questions.

• Behavior/cognition/language
• Biological rhythms
• Brain imaging or neuroimaging
• Cell biology
• Cell imaging & Electrophysiology
• Learning/memory
• Signal transduction
• Neurobiology of the neuron
• Neurotransmitter
• Sensation and perception
• Sleep
• Autonomic nervous system and homeostasis
• Arousal, attention and emotion
• Genetics of the nervous system
• Developmental biology of the nervous system
• Diseases of the nervous system

Neuroscience Media

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  Drawing by Santiago Ramón y Cajal (1899) of neurons in the pigeon cerebellum

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  Illustration from Gray's Anatomy (1918) of a lateral view of the human brain, featuring the hippocampus among other neuroanatomical features

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  The Golgi stain first allowed for the visualization of individual neurons.

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  3-D sensory and motor homunculus models at the Natural History Museum, London

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  A diagram of the human nervous system.

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  Photograph of a stained neuron in a chicken embryo

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  Proposed organization of motor-semantic neural circuits for action language comprehension. Adapted from Shebani et al. (2013).

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  An MRI of a human head showing benign familial macrocephaly (head circumference > 60 cm)

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  Ivan Pavlov, Nobel Prize in Physiology 1904. Official Nobel Prize photo (1904)

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  Camillo Golgi, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1906

Related pages

• Agonist
• Biology
• Cognitive neuropsychology
• Ethology
• Neurology
• Neurolinguistic programming
• Neuropsychology
• Psychiatry

Textbooks

• Bear, M.F.. Neuroscience: Exploring the Brain (2001). Baltimore: Lippincott. ISBN 0-7817-3944-6.
• Kandel, ER. Principles of Neural Science (2000). New York: McGraw-Hill. ISBN 0-8385-7701-6.
• Squire, L. et al. (2003). Fundamental Neuroscience, 2nd edition. Academic Press; ISBN 0-12-660303-0
• Byrne and Roberts (2004). From Molecules to Networks. Academic Press; ISBN 0-12-148660-5
• Sanes, Reh, Harris (2005). Development of the Nervous System, 2nd edition. Academic Press; ISBN 0-12-618621-9
• Siegel et al. (2005). Basic Neurochemistry, 7th edition. Academic Press; ISBN 0-12-088397-X
• Rieke, F. et al. (1999). Spikes: Exploring the Neural Code. The MIT Press; Reprint edition ISBN 0-262-68108-0

Online textbooks

• Neuroscience 2nd ed. Dale Purves et al. Published by Sinauer Associates, Inc., 2001.
• Basic Neurochemistry: Molecular, Cellular, and Medical Aspects 6th ed. by George J. Siegel et al. Published by Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins, 1999.

Popular works

• Andreasen, Nancy C.. Brave New Brain: Conquering Mental Illness in the Era of the Genome (March 4, 2004)Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-1951-4509-0. Retrieved March 30, 2007.
• Damasio, A. R. (1994). Descartes' Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain. New York, Avon Books. ISBN 0-399-13894-3 (Hardcover) ISBN 0-380-72647-5 (Paperback)
• Gardner, H. (1976). The Shattered Mind: The Person After Brain Damage. New York, Vintage Books, 1976 ISBN 0-394-71946-8
• Luria, A. R. (1997). The Man with a Shattered World: The History of a Brain Wound. Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-224-00792-0 (Hardcover) ISBN 0-674-54625-3 (Paperback)
• Sacks, O. The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. Summit Books ISBN 0-671-55471-9 (Hardcover) ISBN 0-06-097079-0 (Paperback)
• Sacks, O. (1990). Awakenings. New York, Vintage Books. (See also Oliver Sacks) ISBN 0-671-64834-9 (Hardcover) ISBN 0-06-097368-4 (Paperback)
• Sternberg, E. (2007) Are You a Machine? The Brain, the Mind and What it Means to be Human. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books.

Other websites

• High-Resolution Cytoarchitectural Primate Brain Atlases Archived 2019-06-21 at the Wayback Machine
• Society for Neuroscience
• Neural Plasticity-Open Access Journal (Hindawi Publishing)
• Neuroscience. 2nd ed. by Purves et al. (online textbook)
• Neuroscience for Kids