brain Posts

The filling of being undervalued by society makes retired people indifferent and lazy. Seniors usually have difficulty to operate computers and everything related to a new technology employment. With the age it becomes difficult to remember names, telephone numbers and various scheduled tasks including appointments with doctors etc. That’s because mind becomes inactive due to lost connections between neurons in the brain. It is always a challenge for seniors to understand a new ideas or concepts. The best way to keep mind active is to learn something new. The popular principle of “Use it or lose it” exactly matches this problem.

There are some ways to keep mind young and active for all ages including elderly. We can help seniors to get involved to social clubs, play games and puzzles, cards and music. There are numerous interactive videogames available online which are good for seniors. For instance Nintendo’s Brain Age is very good for stimulating seniors’ minds. Seniors like play games if they are encouraged to do that. Communicating and playing with people, seniors can maintain and improve their mental health. Especially when game and fun are paralleled that helps a lot.

The human brain consists of up to 100 billion of neurons. Every single neuron in the brain may be linked up to 10 000 other neurons. What is the role of single neuron in this extremely complicated network? It was accepted that a single brain cell acts like an on-off switch, working in concert with other brain cells to generate an element of thought.

However, as it was suggested recently, the individual neurons are able to recognize people, landmarks and objects - even the letter sequence of names. Can you believe that?

This new understanding of individual neurons as 'thinking cells' is an important step toward cracking the brain's cognition code. Individual brain cells, neurons are able to function like sophisticated computers. That’s why our brains are so powerful and even very super-super computer can’t compete with human brain even with one having externally low IQ. 

Cerebellum means “little brain” in Latin. It makes about 10% of the total brain volume, however contains more than 50% of all neuronal cells of the entire brain. That’s possible because the main type of neuronal cells in cerebellum is tiny granular cells. The shape of cerebellum resembles a cauliflower. This brain structure is located above brain stem and connected to the brain stem through three bundles of nerve fibers.

    Seizure is an abnormal electrophysiological phenomena causing synchronized  
discharge of brain cells. A group of cells or an entire area of the brain can be involved into this type of activity. As a result of seizure the mental state can be altered and uncontrolled movements can occur.

     If seizure is recurrent than it is an epilepsy, a serious neurological condition. In epilepsy some brain cells discharge although they aren't supposed to. Any sudden imbalance between the excitatory and inhibitory inputs to a network of neurons may bring to excessive excitability and seizure. Abnormal metabolism, chemical imbalance, allergies, poisoning, brain infections, stroke, brain tumors and injures and many other factors can cause this condition.

    Epilepsy affects much more people than cancer, tuberculoses and multiple scleroses together.  Over 2.5 million people in USA diagnosed with epilepsy. It doesn’t have age- dependency and for many people the cause is unknown. The leading cause of epilepsy for children is birth trauma, for adults are - automobile accidents, for people over 65 are strokes.

    The most essential part of cause for epilepsy, not depending on age, is the stress.
Stress can be the result of overwork, dissatisfaction with others, not enough sleep, fear, anger, overeating of wrong foods (a regular American diet), money or time pressure, tense relations in family and work. 

Our brain has four general states of operation: Full Conscious Awareness, the Hypnotic  State, the Dream  State, and the Sleep  State. These states are characterized by different type of electric activity in brain and are defined by frequency range obtained by EEG.

First state - Full Conscious Awareness- our mind is attentive and uses logic to reason, assess, evaluate, and make decisions.

Second - Hypnotic State-, memories become easily accessible and more new information is stored because the door between conscious and subconscious is opened. The person is not really "thinking" in the traditional sense but "experiencing" without critical judgment or analysis or questioning because the conscious mind is not getting in the way. Every time when we getting from first level to Dream State(third state) or Sleep State(fourth state) levels we pass through the Hypnotic state.

 We are in this state whenever we are completely absorbed by movie, show or person. Therefore we stop judging and we believe that’s true whatever we see  or hear. Our conscious is off every time when we see something extraordinary: very nice car, a beautiful woman, very high, very big, very nice, very ugly,very strong, very bright,  very interesting, very famous individual, and anything very - very. Commercials work that way.

Nervous system is made up of gray and white matter.  Brain consists of neuronal cells-neurons .Every cell has a body ("gray matter") and the cable-like processes- that extend from the cell bodies ("white matter"). Our skills and abilities are correlated with density of neuronal cells (white matter) while the speed of information processing is governed by a gray matter.

The structural brain-scan study has shown the age –dependent changes in gray matter volume and distribution. Different learning and memory problems are the results of   decreased gray matter in particular regions of the brain. Although the amount of gray matter is the arbiter of knowledge, however, the number of connections between neurons is also important.

 It is very interesting that with age gray matter declines starting  from adolescence  while  white matter keeps growing all the time. If we lose connections we lose everything. This is true for life as well as for our brain function. A number of neurological diseases are the results of impaired connections or their complete lose.

Thought is an idea, conception, or opinion arising in our mind.

 If it is raised as a conception, it can be as a general understanding of something based on moral and logical considerations.

When it appears as an opinion, it is based mainly on personal judgment, not necessarily associated with views held by other people.

 We are individuals with our appearance and thoughts. Based on our thoughts we do make decisions every time before any action. What is happening inside our brain when we think?

 Brain is an electrochemical organ and it uses an electromagnetic energy to function. Electrical currents are passing through the neuronal network and different chemical reactions are happening inside the brain when we think and act.

The Human Brain is that which sets us apart from all other biological species on earth (and may be in universe). As far as we know, humans are the only creatures who think, analyze, create music, literature and art, travel in space, and walk on the surface of moon and so on. Brain shapes our action, imagination, hopes and dreams.

 Brain has been compared to a supercomputer, however is much more complicated than any known man-made device.  About 3 pound of fatty tissue of our brain consists of two kinds of cells: neurons and glial cells (supportive tissue). It is estimated that there are about 200 billion neurons in adult human brain. Also, there are about 10000 different types of neurons.

Neuron, the functional unit of the brain,  has a body, axon and dendrites. The axon is like a fiber-optic cable carrying outgoing messages (electrical impulses) to the target cells in different locations of our body. Dendrites are tree-like formations where axons from other neurons form a communication unit- synapse. The function of synapse is basically transferring signal from one neuron to another. Each neuron in the brain is connected to hundreds of thousands other neurons. Can you Imagine how complex this network is ?