Neuroscience

This book offers a fundamental new theory of motor cortex organization: the rendering of the movement repertoire onto the cortex. The action repertoire of an animal is highly dimensional, whereas the cortical sheet is two-dimensional. Rendering the action space onto the cortex therefore results in a complex pattern, explaining the otherwise inexplicable details of motor cortex organization. This book includes a complete history of motor cortex research from its discovery to the present, a discussion of the major issues in motor cortex research, and an account of recent experiments that led to the book's “action map” view. Though focused on motor cortex, the book includes a range of topics from an explanation of how primates put food in their mouths, to the origins of social behavior such as smiling and laughing, to the mysterious link between movement disorders and autism.

There are many ways to study the brain. Although anatomical and physiological studies can help us understand the substrates of behavior, most of what we have learned about how the brain mediates behavior comes from experiments of nature in which focal brain injuries induced by diseases, such as stroke, produce behavioral changes. This book focuses on what the lesion method has taught us about how the brain works. In this book a renowned neurologist recounts his experiences seeing patients with behavioral deficits caused by various brain disease and injuries, cognitive disorders, and memory disorders (such as aphasia, alexia, agraphia, agnosia, apraxia, and dementia), and explains what they have taught him about brain function and dysfunction. The book discusses brain behavior relationships, particularly issues related to neurological patients and their families.

Magnetoencephalography (MEG) is an exciting brain imaging technology that allows real-time tracking of neural activity, making it an invaluable tool for advancing our understanding of brain function. This introduction to MEG brings together chapters which provide the basic tools for planning and executing MEG experiments, as well as analyzing and interpreting the resulting data. Chapters on the basics describe the fundamentals of MEG and its instrumentation, and provide guidelines for designing experiments and performing successful measurements. Chapters on data analysis present it in detail, from general concepts and assumptions to analysis of evoked responses and oscillatory background activity. Chapters on solutions propose potential solutions to the inverse problem using techniques such as minimum norm estimates, spatial filters, and beamformers. Chapters on combinations elucidate how MEG can be used to complement other neuroimaging techniques. Chapters on applications provide practical examples of how to use MEG to study sensory processing and cognitive tasks, and how MEG can be used in a clinical setting.

This book presents a unified approach to understanding memory, attention, and decision-making. It shows how these fundamental functions for cognitive neuroscience can be understood in a common and unifying computational neuroscience framework. This framework links empirical research on brain function from neurophysiology, functional neuroimaging, and the effects of brain damage, to a description of how neural networks in the brain implement these functions using a set of common principles. The book describes the principles of operation of these networks, and how they could implement such important functions as memory, attention, and decision-making. The book discusses the hippocampus and memory, reward- and punishment-related learning, emotion and motivation, invariant visual object recognition learning, short-term memory, attention, biased competition, probabilistic decision-making, action selection, and decision-making.

In the first comprehensive study of the relationship between music and language from the standpoint of cognitive neuroscience, the author challenges the widespread belief that music and language are processed independently. Since Plato's time, the relationship between music and language has attracted interest and debate from a wide range of thinkers. Recently, scientific research on this topic has been growing rapidly, as scholars from diverse disciplines including linguistics, cognitive science, music cognition, and neuroscience are drawn to the music-language interface as one way to explore the extent to which different mental abilities are processed by separate brain mechanisms. Accordingly, the relevant data and theories have been spread across a range of disciplines. This book provides the first synthesis, arguing that music and language share deep and critical connections, and that comparative research provides a powerful way to study the cognitive and neural mechanisms underlying these uniquely human abilities.

A great deal is now known about the cellular changes that take place in neural circuits and, over the past twenty years, the chick has proved to be an invaluable model for work on memory formation. The prior experience of the chick is controllable in a way that is impossible to match in any other vertebrate, and the pharmacology and phases of memory formation are better established. In addition, the anatomy of the chick brain is now well established, allowing valuable comparisons with animal models. This book reviews all the main aspects of work on learning and plasticity in behaviour and neural mechanisms in the chick, together with related topics such as the development of behaviour and lateralization of function. It is an authoritative reference for researchers who wish to use the chick or to draw on the relevant literature. The aim is to introduce a wider audience to the chick as an experimental model, and to describe the way in which it has been used in the investigation of learning and plasticity at every level, from the behavioural to the molecular.

Reading is a unique human skill, and modern societies rely extensively on literacy skills. Reading disability can therefore have a profound personal, economic, and social impact. However, the scientific understanding of the neural basis of reading in the normal brain is underdeveloped. A better understanding of normal reading processes could help individuals with developmental dyslexia and those with reading disabilities gained through injury or disease. Neuroimaging offers a unique window on reading and has allowed us to reach interesting insights about the neural correlates of reading in health and disease. It has also raised questions for scientific debate. The whole field of reading research is very much a dynamic and growing one. This book provides some seasoned insights and to offer a window into various conceptual and technical issues that continue to be discussed and developed.

This book explores the relationship between cellular processes and animal behaviour. It does this by focusing on the domain of navigation, bringing together scientists from either side of the brain-behaviour divide in an attempt to explain the linkage between spatial behaviour and the underlying activity of neurons. The book is organised into two sections. Section One deals with the so-called ‘higher’ levels of description — studies of spatial behaviour and the brain areas that might underlie such behaviour. It begins with insects, remarkably sophisticated navigators, and ends with humans, examining along the way issues such as whether animal brains contain maps and whether spatial and non-spatial information interact, and if so, how? Section Two delves further into the brain and focuses on the mammalian representation of space and the role of place cells. These issues have far wider ramifications than simply helping us to understand the process of navigation. This system might provide a model for how other forms of knowledge, beliefs, and intentions are encoded in neurons.

Neuroergonomics can be defined as the study of brain and behavior at work. It combines two disciplines: neuroscience, the study of brain structure and function; and ergonomics, the study of how to match technology with the capabilities and limitations of people so they can work effectively and safely. The goal of merging these two fields is to use the startling discoveries of human brain and physiological functioning both to inform the design of technologies in the workplace and home, and to provide new training methods that enhance performance, expand capabilities, and optimize the fit between people and technology. Research in the area of neuroergonomics has blossomed in recent years with the emergence of non-invasive techniques for monitoring human brain function that can be used to study various aspects of human behavior in relation to technology and work, including mental workload, visual attention, working memory, motor control, human-automation interaction, and adaptive automation. This book provides an overview of this emerging area, describing the theoretical background, basic research, major methods, as well as the new and future areas of application.

Recent advances in the brain sciences have dramatically improved our understanding of brain function. As we find out more and more about what makes us tick, we must stop and consider the ethical implications of this new found knowledge. Will having a new biology of the brain through imaging make us less responsible for our behavior and lose our free will? Should certain brain scan studies be disallowed on the basis of moral grounds? Why is the media so interested in reporting results of brain imaging studies? What ethical lessons from the past can best inform the future of brain imaging? These compelling questions and many more are tackled by a group of contributors to this book on neuroethics. The wide range of disciplinary backgrounds that this book represents, from neuroscience, bioethics and philosophy, to law, social and health care policy, education, religion, and film, allow for profoundly insightful and provocative answers to these questions, and open up the door to a host of new ones. The contributions highlight the timeliness of modern neuroethics today, and assure the longevity and importance of neuroethics for generations to come.