Includes On the Web and In the News links curated by the authors, along with other audio/video content.

Click on the following links. Please note these will open in a new window.

News

In the News: Breastmilk Consumption Is Good for the Brain

Description: This news story on the link between breastmilk consumption and healthy nervous system development accompanies the In the News feature in this chapter.

Video

Video 1: Components of the CNS

Description: This video explores  how your brain develops and how important location is for each of your brain's many functions.

Video 2: Structure and Circuitry of the Brain

Description: How can we understand how your brain works.

Video 3: What Protects the Brain from Damage?

Description: The cerebral spinal fluid, the meninges, and the skull serve to protect the brain.

Video 4: What Does the PNS Do?

Description:This video will look at your peripheral nervous system, its afferent and efferent divisions, and how it processes information.

Video 5: Brain-Computer Interfaces

Description: Neuroengineer Rajesh Rao of the University of Washington is developing brain–computer interfaces, devices that can monitor and extract brain activity to enable a machine or computer to accomplish tasks, from playing video games to controlling a prosthetic arm.

Video 6: How Brains Are Built

Description:The story of brain development.

Audio

Audio 1: The Story of Phineas Gage

Description: In 1848, Phineas Gage experienced a catastrophic brain injury and survived –though altered –for more than 11 years.

Web

On the Web 1: Whole Brain Atlas/HOPES Brain Tutorial

Description: The Whole Brain Atlas has images of normal and diseased or damaged brains. The HOPES Brain Tutorial will help you visualize how the brain is organized. The final segment, Build a Brain, is the best.

On the Web 2: History of Psychosurgery

Description: The History of Psychosurgery, from trephining (drilling holes in the skull to let evil spirits out) to lobotomy to more recent experimental attempts, is the subject of this sometimes less than professional but very interesting website. At Lobotomy’s Hall of Fame you will learn, for example, that sisters of the playwright Tennessee Williams and President John F. Kennedy had lobotomies (the story that actress Frances Farmer had a lobotomy turned out to be a fabrication).

On the Web 3: Healthline’s/brainline

Description: Healthline’s interactive brain allows you to examine external and internal features and rotate them 360˚ for a better view; brainline adds functions of these areas and symptoms when they are damaged.

On the Web 4: The Dana Foundation

Description: The Dana Foundation offers regular updates on the latest findings in neuroscience research.

On the Web 5: Periventricular heterotopia/Organization on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome

Description: Genetics Home Reference gives a good description of periventricular heterotopia and its genetic causes. The National Organization on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome has information and statistics on the disorder.

On the Web 6: American Association of Neurological Surgeons

Description: The website has information on traumatic brain injury and incidence frequency for the riskiest sports.

On the Web 7: Human Adult Neurogenesis

Description: Read a news article about the use of carbon 14 nuclear fallout to document human adult neurogenesis.

On the Web 8: Miami Project to Cure Paralysis/Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation

Description: The Miami Project to Cure Paralysis at the University of Miami School of Medicine has summaries of basic and clinical research on central nervous system damage. The Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation site provides information about spinal cord damage research.

On the Web 9: Stem Cell Information

Description: The National Institutes of Health’s Stem Cell Information site is a good resource for information about stem cells and their potential.

On the Web 10: BrainGate Lets Your Brain Control the Computer/Controlling a Robotic Arm/Moderately Successful Stem Cell Treatment

Description: BrainGate Lets Your Brain Control the Computer is a video explanation of the BrainGate system, which shows the patient controlling a computer and a prosthetic hand. A second video shows a paralyzed woman controlling a robotic arm to drink coffee, and a third documents a man’s moderately successful stem cell treatment for a spinal cord injury.