Autonomic nervous system

Without curious minds, much would not have changed in the world. Curiosity may have killed the cat but not before providing some answers. Despite the infinite volume of questions one could ask, it becomes hard to come up with a question interesting enough to pursue beyond a few google searched answers. With information so easily accessible, hunting for answers isn’t always very difficult and yet, when prompted to answer them, sometimes we still draw blanks. During tests, people can get stuck on…

Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is a disease or autoimmune disorder which affects the central nervous system of an individual; the brain and spinal cord. Though not much is known of the cause of MS, researchers believe that Multiple Sclerosis causes the body’s immune system to attack the myelin sheath. The myelin sheaths are an insulating coating around the nerve cells, consisting of a mixture of proteins and phospholipids, which help to increase the speed at which nerve impulses are conducted. As the…

How many times have you walked into a room and suddenly forgotten why you went in there in the first place? When this happens, do you joke that you’ve just had “a senior moment?” Most of us believe that cognitive decline is just a part of the aging process. In fact, until very recently, scientists believed that the brain stopped making new neural connections when the body stopped developing, at about age 20. This would mean that our memory and other cognitive functions would get irreversibly…

Introduction As homeotherms, humans have the ability to control thermoregulatory mechanisms: physiological processes that are critical to maintaining core temperature within a very narrow limit. Although peripheral temperature fluctuates regularly & often largely in response to ambient temperature, core temperature must be maintained within a tight window in order for the human body to function properly. Throughout the course of circadian rhythm, the body’s core temperature can fluctuate by up…

oligodendrocytes and myelin sheaths of the central nervous system (CNS) deteriorate and are replaced by hardened scar tissue. To understand how MS affects the nervous system, we must understand how neurons transmit messages. Neurons transmit messages through the nervous system across a small gap called the synapse. At the synapse, electrical impulses are converted into chemical impulses in order to cross the synapse. A normal functioning nervous system includes healthy myelin sheaths that allow…

or not sick their brain can make their body work with them. So that means that if someone wanted to “make themselves smarter” or “more intelligent” your brain works faster or it doesn’t make you feel as nervous or stomped as it does when someone, per say, is taking an exam and they become too nervous and worried that their brain focuses on that instead of the work. If there is a person that goes into a test that they made have studied hours for thinking ‘I will fail’ then their brain will be so…

Throughout History, many have , the idea of “development”. And have come to the conclusion that there isn 't one factor that can predict why in the end we turn out the way we do. All that can be proven is that the adolescent years within someone 's and their environment life play a very important role in the development of someone mentally, physically and emotionally. The concept of nature, our biological makeup or nurture, the environment we are placed in affecting our development has become…

Do you remember the last time someone told you to brush your teeth? Hopefully, it has been a long time since you even thought twice about it because that once tedious chore has become a habit. Habits are apparent in your daily life in a multitude of ways; from the positive habits, like brushing your teeth and exercising, to the negative habits such as biting your nails. That being said, habits are essential to living a productive, healthy life, yet most people cannot recall when a simple action…

A change within the frequency of alleles in a population occurs on two distinct levels known as macro and microevolutions. The latter is explained as an alteration within a species’ environment that force adaptations in the group; a necessity for survival and reproduction. The evolution and adaptation of the human brain first occurred through a microevolution. As humans struggled to survive their brains grew and developed according to environmental changes; which are not always synonymous with…

being related to these encoded genes. Researchers studying Huntington’s were able to find that organisms with more sophisticated nervous systems had significant differences in CAG triplets and repeats. These CAG Triplets in human organisms reach a max extension, compared to less sophisticated organisms. The higher number of vertebrates with more sophisticated nervous systems might imply that the longer and more repeats of the CAG triplets there are, show evolution between organisms of the same…