3. STRUCTURE OF THE COURSE: HOW
• 50 minutes: Frontal Lecture…but open to discussion.
•Feel free to ask questions!
• 10 minutes BREAK: you and me to recover a bit!
• After each topic, some practical exercise…good training for the final
exam
4. STRUCTURE OF THE COURSE: WHAT
• Chapter 01: Historical review .
• Chapter 02: Cell biology of neurons
• Chapter 03 - 04: Physiology of neural membrane
• Chapter 05 - 06: Communication between neurons
• Chapter 07: Anatomy of the nervous system
• Chapter 08: Smell and Taste
• Chapter 09 - 10: Visual system
• Chapter 11: Auditory system
• Chapter 12: Somatic sensory system
• Chapter 13 - 14: Motor systems
Textbook: Bear, Connors, Paradiso “Neuroscience,
exploring the brain – 3rd edition”
Additional material on the webpage of the course
Take home message…a lot of stuff to do.
5. STRUCTURE OF THE COURSE: WHO
Torino, Italy Milano, Italy London, UK
Trieste, Italy
Zurich, Switzerland
8. THE ORIGINS OF NEUROSCIENCE
Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous
system.
Relatively young term (Society for Neuroscience 1969)
..but curiosity about the brain and how it works is old as
much as the mankind itself
9. 7000 B.C. ... long time ago
• Prehistoric ancestors
– Brain vital to life
• Skull surgeries
– Evidence: Trepanation
– Skulls show signs of healing
10. 5000 B.C. ... Ancient Egypt
Heart: Seat of soul and memory (not the head)
Mummification process
Canopic Jars were used to hold the organs of the dead after they were
embalmed.
The four organs housed by the jars were the lungs, the stomach, the liver
and the intestines.
Egyptians held no regard for the brain, which was discarded.
The heart (scarab) was left inside the body, to be judged in the afterlife
11. 500 B.C. ... Ancient Greece
Hippocrates (460 -379 B.C.)
• Brain: Involved in sensation;
• Seat of intelligence
Aristotle (384 -322 B.C.)
• Heart: centre of intellect;
• Brain: Radiator for the cooling
of the blood
12. A.D. ... Roman Empire
Galen (130 -200 A.D.)
Correlation between structure and function
• Cerebrum: soft = sensations
• Cerebellum: hard= movements
• Ventricles: contains fluids which
movements to or from regulate perception
and actions
13. From Reinassance to the XIX Century
The Renaissance
Fluid-mechanical theory of brain function
Philosophical mind-brain distinction
Descartes (1596-1650)
The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries
Gray matter and white matter observation
Basic anatomical subdivisions of PNS and CNS
Identifications of gyri, sulci, and fissures
Beginning of the Nineteenth Century
Nerve as wires, understanding of electrical phenomena,
brain can generate electricity
Studies of Charles Bell and Francois Magendie on ventral
and dorsal roots of the nerves
14. the XIX Century
Localization of Function in the Brain
.
If spinal roots carry differential functional information then
different parts of the brain are specialized to process this
information
1809 - Phrenology
Franz Joseph Gall
1823 - Experimental ablation method
Marie-Jean-Pierre Flourens
1861 – Lesioned patients
Paul Broca
15. the XIX Century
Cerebral localization in animals Neuron as the basic
Nervous systems of different
function of the brain
species may share common
mechanisms
16. Neuroscience today
Levels of Analysis
Molecular (i.e. neurotransmitter, enzymes etc.)
Cellular (i.e. types of neurons and their properties)
Systems (i.e. visual, auditory etc.)
Behavioral (from networks to behaviors)
Cognitive ( from brain to mind, i.e. consciousness)
