20 Time Final Reflection

So our (Vega and my) project was What the drought was all about. At first we didn't know what we wanted to do. We knew we wanted to learn, educate, and solve. Which basically means we wanted to learn about the drought, teach people about the drought, and find solutions for it. For majority of the project we were just researching because we had no idea what people did and did not know. Eventually after we sent out our survey we figured out that we wanted to educate people of the Agricultural part of the drought. It took us a while to finally decide to focus on agriculture because we sent out the survey pretty late. Our main means of educating was the TED talk we did in class (which is embedded down below). 

I really enjoyed working on this project because I learned how team work makes everything a lot less stressful when you have a good partner. If I was to have a different partner we might of had more differences on ideas and the work load might of been unequally distributed. I found a new passion for the drought and actually applied it to my current lifestyle. The freedom of being about to do something you really enjoy and incorporate with school is a life changing experience.

Reflex Lab

In this lab we tested different multiple different reflexes, such as the photopupillary reflex and Patellar reflex. From the notes we learned that reflexes are "rapid, predictable, and involuntary responses to stimuli." Which means that the information does not reach the brain, the nerve impulses go to the spinal cord.

We first tested the photopupillary reflex which when stimulated causes the iris to contract and pupil to reduce in size. When a bright light was shined in my eye this reflex was triggered, the result was my pupil decreases. This occurs to protect the eye by lessening the amount of light entering it. You can see this occurring in the video below, right when my hand is removed from my eye.

Second we tested the Knee Jerk Reflex or the Patellar reflex. This reflex occurs when the part below the knee is tapped causing the the thigh muscle to stretch. There is only one synapse to allow this reaction to occur. When my classmate tapped my knee with the rubber instrument my knee swung into a flexed position. Humans have evolved this trait to be able to modify their body to maintain balance.

Third was the blink reflex. Basically demonstrates how when something comes close to our eyes we close them to protect our eyes from damage. When I threw a cotton ball near my classmate's face she blinked, demonstrating this effect.

Fourth was testing plantar flexion yet again, but also testing for Babinski's sign. In this test my classmate took a pen and ran it along the bottom of my bare foot. The normal response to this was toes flex and come close together, but my response was Babinski's sign (which means it did the opposite, toes spread apart and upward). I displayed this sign because I am a dancer and have a lot of nerve damage in my feet. People who have multiple sclerosis also display Bainski's sign because of their nerve damage.

In the fifth and final testing we did a reaction time test. This was not a reflex test because it incorporated visual and motor translation. We dropped a ruler above someone's hand and measured how long it took for them to catch the ruler. We did this normally with no distractions and then a second time while texting. The class average for non texting (females) was .1942 seconds, but the reaction time for the same people while texting was .2572 seconds. Even though it doesn't seem like a huge difference to be a hundredth of a second more or less, but when driving that could be the difference between stopping safely behind a car or ramming into it. Driving while texting is very unsafe because it decreases your ability to react as quickly. Our brains cannot multitask they can only jump between activities. 

My Brain Map

In this assignment I explored the "your brain map", which an interactive digital brain. We explored the Cerebral cortex, the neuron, and the Limbic system. We learned things like the neo cortex’s function is to govern your senses, spatial awareness, and motor skills. We learned the neurotransmitter transmit info across the synapse. And we learned the corpus callosum does more than just hold the two hemispheres together, it is a connection between the two sides as far as information goes. 

An interactive infographic by Open Colleges

Cerebral Cortex

1.     What do the frontal lobes do?

 Frontal lobes control personality, problem solving, language, judgment, and impulse control

.  What is the relationship between selective attention and learning?

 Selective attention makes your working capacity greater

3.     What is the last part of your brain to develop and what can you do to prevent it from deteriorating?

 The frontal lobe, you can do exercises to prevent it from deteriorating

4.     What does the neo cortex do?

 The neo cortex’s function is to govern your senses, spatial awareness, and motor skills

5.     What is the role of the pre frontal cortex?

 Pre frontal Cortex control your personality, organizes your thoughts and actions to coincide with your goals

6.     What do we know about the pre frontal cortex’s relationship with multitasking?

 There is no such thing as multitasking; the pre frontal cortex has a “central bottleneck” that prevents you from doing multiple tasks at once.

7.     Which part of the brain is associated with speech and language development?  Give an interesting fact about this region.

      Broca’s area, they have found people who get tumors in this area have their speech unaffected.

8.     Which part of your brain is responsible for thinking the following: “Is it hot in here or is it just me?”

Somatosensory cortex

9.     What does your visual cortex do for you

      It helps you distinguish faces, without it everybody you know would look the same.

10. State three interesting or significant facts about your occipital lobe.

Occipital lobe is the visual processing center, if damaged it could cause blindness or hallucinations, and visualizing tasks can improve your performance in them.

  

11. What would happen if your temporal lobes were damaged?

If the temporal lobes were damaged we wouldn’t have a long term memory which would prevent us from learning the alphabet and reading

12. What is your “fast brain” and what does it do?

Eye fields, they control eye movements and help brain process information quickly

Neuron

13. State 3 things that you could do that would influence your synapses, and have a positive affect on your life and health.

Exercise, socializing, and sleep.

14. What is the relationship between multi-sensory or multi-modal learning and your dendrites?

If you do something that engages many parts of your brain, the cross-referencing of data converts the new knowledge from something you have memorized to something you have learned.

15. How does “big picture thinking” and mnemonics affect dendrites and/or learning?

Studies show that you need “big picture thinking” to completely understand a subject. Mnemonics helped people associate the subject with already relevant information in order to recall it

16. Describe a neurotransmitter that you feel is very important.  Justify your reasoning.

 A neurotransmitter transmits signals across a chemical synapse to a target neuron or cell. Neurotransmitters are important because the transfer information along the cells that allow your body to do things like breath, have a heartbeat, and make your stomach digest.

Limbic System

17. What does the corpus callosum do?

 The corpus callosum communicates information from left and right hemispheres of the brain.  It deals with cognitive, motor, and sensory functions.

18. What is the relationship between music and the corpus callosum?

     Musical practice increase the communicating between the two hemispheres

19. Why is the thalamus important?

     The thalamus is important because it stores memories. Like a mental library.

Brain Dissection

This dissection was all about the brain. It wasn't as much dissection as it was discovery and viewing the main parts. We had only a few cuts, but we were able to identify the cerebrum, cerebellum, brain stem, corupus collosum, medulla oblongata, pons, midbrain, thalamus, and hypothalamus. After figuring out the location of each of the structures we looked through our notes to discover the function. The following functions go as follows. Firstly, the cerebrum in the brain provides for higher brain functions such as thoughts or actions. The cerebellum coordinates and regulates muscular activity. The brain stem transports information to and from the brain.  The myelin is the coating on the outside of a neuron. The myelin's function is to increase the speed of nerve impulses. The optic nerve main purpose is to transfers visual information from the retina to the visual centers of the brain from electrical impulses. The corpus collosum is a large bundle of neuron fibers that connects the two hemispheres of the brain. The midbrain controls breathing. The medulla oblongata aids in digestion. The pons helps with circulation.  Finally, thalamus' main function is to sort data and the hypothalamus' main function is to maintain homeostasis.

   

     
  

 

 

Sheep Eye Dissection

In this lab we dissected the eye of a sheep which is very similar to the human. Firstly we look at outer portion of the eye which includes the cornea, sclera, extrinsic muscles, fatty tissue, and optic nerve. The cornea is the outermost lens of the eye. It is cloudy because it is non living. The main job of the cornea is to focus the entry of light into the eye.The sclera is the white portion of the eye, it the toughest part of the eye specifically made strong to help prevent against injury. The extrinsic muscles allow the eye to move is many directions, we have 6 which give us a larger range of motion. Fatty tissue is the yellowy stuff surrounding the eye, its main job is to cushion the eye. Finally the optic nerve (picture 2), located at the back of the eye the optic nerve transfers visual information from the eye to the brain. Next we made an incision in the sclera which separated the eye into two hemispheres. In the picture the left hemisphere consists of the vitreous humor a gelatinous substance that helps keep the shape of the eye. The right hemisphere (posterior cavity) consists of the retina and the choroid. The retina processes light information and converts it to an image. If you peel away the that tissue you reveal the black choroid. The choroid is black due to pigments, it absorbs light so it doesn't bounce around the eye. After this we removed the vitreous humor from the left hemisphere (anterior part) this then reveal the lens, ciliary body, and suspensory ligaments. The lens is convex shaped, connected to the vitreous humor, and held in place by suspensory ligaments (picture 6 shows lens when removed from cavity). The lens bends rays of light in eye. Picture 7 shows the empty anterior cavity of the eye. The ciliary body is the mushroom looking lines/folds in this cavity, they contract to help adjust the lens. The aqueous humor can be found here too, much like the vitreous it is gelatinous and helps hold eye shape. The iris and pupil are also visible. The pupil is the small opening and the iris is the colored part surrounding the pupil. The pupil controls the amount of light that can enter the eye while the iris dilates and constricts the pupil size, this controlling light flow. The eye was very complex, but also very interesting to learn about.

                                                                          

Brain Clay Model

This is our model of the brain constructed entirely of clay. We included an outside view and an inside view (the left hemisphere along the sagittal plane and the right cerebral hemisphere) Major parts are labeled.

What If Part of Your Brain Was Missing?

Today I read an article titled "the girl with a hole in her brain". She is one of 9 living people who have been diagnosed with a missing cerebellum. If someone was to be missing this vital part of the organ they could possibly be severely mentally impaired, have movement disorders, or even epilepsy.But this women was different. What doctors can only describe as "less than would be expected",this women has only mild balance and speech problems. She's gone a whole 24 without noticing this problem until recently when she reported having dizziness and nausea. This led to a CAT scan and the discovery of the "hole" in her brain. 

To discover more about the brains other parts I was assigned to research about the Transverse fissure. More specifically to see if we could live without it. The transverse fissure is long narrow opening or space that separates the cerebrum from the cerebellum. I couldn't find any information on if a person could or could not live without a cerebral transverse fissure. From what I can infer if the space was not their the cerebellum would just be more fused to the cerebrum.