Article on the topic
A clear mind and an efficient body. Neurologist on extending active life
You may not even realize that the most complex object in the Universe is located inside our skull. It has more than 100 billion cells, and each of them has tens of thousands of connections with its “neighbors.” If you count the number of possible combinations, it will many times exceed the number of atoms in the Universe. This object is the human brain. Sergei Savelyev , professor, head of the laboratory of the Institute of Human Morphology of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences , has been studying it for more than 30 years, and the unique “Stereoscopic Atlas of the Brain” he created created a sensation among biologists.
Prefrontal association area
There are three association cortical areas in the cerebral cortex:
- prefrontal (from 8 to 11 and from 44 to 47 according to Brodmann);
- parieto-temporo-occipital (located in fields 39, 40 and sections 19, 21, 22 and 37);
- limbic (in fields 23, 24, 38, 28 and 11).
The prefrontal association area is located in front of the premotor area. It receives information from areas of the cerebral cortex that perform various functions, such as information processing, regulation of volitional movements, memory consolidation, processing information about emotional state and motivation.
The prefrontal association area integrates this diverse information, resulting in its involvement in a variety of functions.
The prefrontal association area performs the following functions:
About male retribution
"AiF": - Where exactly are our talents stored? Let's say a person draws well - and how will his brain differ from another?
S.S. : — It will have larger certain fields. The fields of the occipital lobe of the brain are responsible for vision. And to draw anything, you need to connect about 15 more areas associated with motor coordination. Associative centers, the same ones with which we think, lie in the frontal lobe and partly in the parietal lobe. Auditory - in the temporal. Our individual characteristics and predispositions are mainly contained in the cerebral cortex. The sizes of the same fields vary tens of times among people. Therefore, you cannot develop abilities that do not exist. We must try to realize what is given.
“AiF”: — But for this it is necessary to “look” into the brain of a living person. Is it possible?
S.S.: — There is, for example, the method of X-ray microscopy (by the way, we are one of the developers of this technology). An X-ray gives a magnified picture of the brain. Unfortunately, it is not yet possible to examine large objects. The technology requires serious funding, but, as always, there is no money. But if the method is developed, it will be a breakthrough: it will be possible to determine who should become a mathematician, who should become a musician, and who should take a broom and go sweep the yard.
"AiF": - Are there differences between the male brain and the female brain? It’s not for nothing that they talk about “female logic.”
S.S.: — In men, the brain is 35-150 grams heavier due to the fact that associative centers are better developed. This is how evolution decreed: a woman is more biological, all her decisions are aimed at surviving, giving offspring, and increasing dominance. This is called “female logic”. This is fine. Just like the fact that men pay for their ability to think with shorter life expectancy. And in general they are less adapted to it.
Responsible for RAM (working) memory
Responsible for operative (working) memory - RAM means the ability to briefly remember new information or retrieve information stored in long-term memory necessary to solve a given task or problem.
Working memory includes the information processing process that must be performed to achieve a goal. The prefrontal association area has been found to be activated whenever we make a conscious attempt to remember or remember information.
RAM allows you to speak, think logically, perform math, and solve complex problems. Working memory is believed to be the basis of abstract and conceptual thinking, which largely determines human intelligence.
Working memory is severely impaired when the prefrontal cortex of the brain is damaged, causing all thought processes to suffer.
Brain and “scattered elements”)
"Core"
- a morphologically homogeneous group of cells with an accurate projection of receptor fields
“Scattered elements”
- cells and groups of cells located outside the “nucleus” and carrying out elementary analysis and synthesis
Areas of the cerebral cortex
Primary
- projection zones (sensitive and motor), responsible for elementary acts
Secondary
- projection-associative zones, responsible for the operations of gnosis and praxis
Tertiary
- areas of overlap of cortical representations of various analyzers, performing an integrative function
Integrative levels of the nervous system
First signaling system
- responsible for the primary stages of praxis and gnosis
Second signaling system
- responsible for the meaningfulness of a person’s actions and his speech
Third signaling system
- responsible for predicting various acts, forming perspectives and choosing priority tasks
Main centers of the cerebral cortex
Frontal lobe
- Motor analyzer
- Located in the region of the anterior central gyrus and paracentral lobule (areas 4, 6, 6A according to Brodmann)
- Center of rotation of the head and eyes in the opposite direction
- Located in the middle frontal gyrus, premotor area (Brodmann fields 8.9)
- Frontopontocerebellar tract
- Starts from the posterior parts of the superior frontal gyrus (field
- Motor speech center (Broca's)
- Located in the posterior part of the inferior frontal gyrus (Brodmann area 44)
- Musical motor center
- Located anterior to the motor speech center (area 45)
- Writing Center
- Located in the posterior part of the middle frontal gyrus (Brodmann area 6)
Parietal lobe
- Center of superficial and deep sensitivity
- Located in the region of the posterior central gyrus (areas 1,2,3 according to Brodmann), the superior parietal region (areas 4,7 according to Brodmann), posterior to the posterior central gyrus (areas 7,39,40 according to Brodmann)
- Praxis Center
- Located in the area of the inferior parietal lobule on the left and in the area of the supramarginal gyrus (areas 39,40 according to Brodmann)
- Interoceptive impulse analyzer
- Located in the region of the lower parts of the anterior and posterior central gyri
Temporal lobe
- Hearing Analyzer Center
- Located in the region of the middle part of the superior temporal gyrus (Heschl), areas 41,42,52 according to Brodmann
- Vestibular Analyzer Center
- Located in the area of the lower parts of the outer surfaces of the temporal lobes (fields 20,21)
- Olfactory Analyzer Center
- Located in the area of the hook and Ammon's horn (fields 11A, 11E)
- Taste Analyzer Center
- Located in the area of the hook, Ammon's horn, the lower part of the posterior central gyrus (area 43) and the insula
- Acoustic-gnostic sensory speech center (Wernicke)
- Located in the region of the posterior parts of the superior temporal gyrus on the left (Brodmann fields 22,37,42)
- Sound and Melodies Recognition Center
- Located in the middle third of the superior temporal gyrus (field 22)
Occipital lobe
- Visual Analyzer Center
- Fields 17,18,19 according to Brodmann
- Writing Analyzer Center (Reading Center)
- Located on the border of the temporal, occipital and parietal lobes (field 39)
Research and disruption of cortical functions
Gnosis (recognition)
A stock of information about the surrounding world with constant comparison with the memory matrix.
Agnosia
- Violation of recognition processes while maintaining sensitivity and consciousness.
- Total agnosia
- Complete disorientation of a person
- Visual agnosia
- Impaired recognition of objects in visual perception
- Auditory agnosia
- Impaired recognition of objects by the noise they produce
- Sensitive agnosia
- Impaired recognition of objects upon contact (astereognosis, etc.)
- Taste agnosia
- Impaired recognition of objects by taste
- Olfactory agnosia
- Impaired recognition of objects by smell
Praxis
Purposeful action.
Apraxia
- Violation of focus and action plan.
- Motor apraxia
- The patient cannot perform actions by order or by imitation, but performs them unintentionally
- Ideatorial apraxia
- The patient cannot perform actions according to orders, but performs them by imitation.
- Constructive apraxia
- The patient performs actions both by order and by imitation, but is not able to create qualitatively new motor acts
- Apraxia occurs when there is damage to the parieto-occipito-temporal region of the dominant hemisphere (bilateral apraxia), subdominant hemisphere and corpus callosum (in right-handed people - left-sided apraxia)
Thinking
Logical operations with verbal and visual-figurative-sensory images of objects.
Mental retardation
A lag in mental development relative to one’s age while maintaining the ability to learn at a high level (with pedagogical and social neglect)
Mental retardation
Intellectual development disorder with learning limitation
Moronism
Maintaining adequate mental development at the everyday, everyday level.
Imbicility
Preservation of primitive motor acts and self-care skills.
Idiocy
Complete lack of speech and social maladjustment.
Memory
There are mechanical and semantic memory. The components of memory are memorization (fixation of material) and recall (reproduction of material). Memory impairment manifests itself in the form of amnesia, hypomnesia, hypermnesia (increased mechanical memory) and the appearance of sensations of “already seen” or “never seen”
The processes of memorization and recall are affected by
<1. Attention
<2. Interest
<3. Emotionality
Speech and its disorders
Classification of speech disorders
Speech impairment due to organic brain damage
Aphasia
— disintegration of speech components with damage to the cortical speech zones
Alalia
— systemic underdevelopment of speech with damage to the cortical speech zones in the pre-speech period
Dysarthria
— disturbance of the innervation of the speech muscles
Functional brain disorders
Stuttering Mutism Surdomutism
Defects in the structure of the articulatory apparatus
Dyslalia Rhinolalia
Delayed speech development (with somatic and pedagogical neglect)
Some types of speech disorders
Wernicke's sensory aphasia
“Verbal deafness”, a violation of speech understanding with damage to the left temporal region (middle and posterior parts of the superior temporal gyrus).
Variants of sensory aphasia
Acoustic-gnostic sensory aphasia
- When auditory gnosis is impaired, a distortion in understanding the meaning of words occurs in the absence of deafness. Develops with damage to the posterior part of Heschl's gyrus of the left hemisphere (area 22 according to Brodmann) Usually combined with a violation of motor speech due to a violation of control over one's own speech by the auditory analyzer.
- Are revealed
- A large number of unnecessary words in the patient’s speech.
- Logorrhea is excessive talkativeness.
- Paraphasia - inaccurate use of words
- Perseverations - monosyllabic answers to questions of different meanings
- Alexia is a reading disorder.
- Contaminations are the spelling of words together in a sentence.
Acoustic-mnestic sensory aphasia
When memory is impaired, it becomes difficult to select the right words while maintaining the grammatical structure of phrases.
Develops with damage to the middle part of Heschl's gyrus of the left hemisphere (Brodmann's areas 37 and 21). The patient usually understands oral and written speech, but there are disturbances in written speech and verbal paraphasia (difficulties in naming objects for which the first syllable prompt does not help) Semantic sensory aphasia
Difficulty in understanding complex logical-grammatical constructions, with difficulty in pronouncing a word, the first syllable prompt helps the patient in pronouncing the latter. Develops with damage to the temporo-parietal-occipital region of the left hemisphere.
Broca's motor aphasia
Apraxia of speech, a combination of impairment of expressive (oral) speech and written language while maintaining its understanding. Reading (aloud) is also usually impaired. It is manifested by the presence in the patient’s speech of monotonous sentences with a predominance of nouns and infinitive forms of verbs.
Literal paraphasia is identified - rearrangement and omission of individual sounds Verbal paraphasia - replacement of one word with another, similar in articulation, but different in meaning Agramatism - violation of the grammatical structure of speech Literal paragraphs when writing Verbal paragraphs Paralexia and other reading disorders
Alalia
They develop in children with brain damage between the ages of 2.5 and 3.0 years.
Sensory alalia
Impaired understanding of spoken speech while hearing is preserved (lack of speech vocabulary), motor speech is necessarily impaired.
Motor alalia
Underdevelopment of motor speech while maintaining understanding of spoken speech.
Important for attention in all its aspects
It is important for attention in all its aspects - this includes focusing on external phenomena and internal thoughts and plans, switching attention, constant attention.
The dorsolateral part of the prefrontal cortex and gyrus are responsible for this function. When the prefrontal cortex of the brain is damaged, patients are easily distracted by random stimuli, which prevents them from maintaining their thoughts in a logical sequence and completing successful actions.
Fitness for the mind
They say that the human brain can be trained, just like the muscles. Solving crossword puzzles is a very effective exercise. You can discuss films and books with friends. Reproduction in memory trains the brain “muscles”. And you can play Sherlock Holmes with your children. When you go for a walk, count how many blue cars have passed and how many passers-by are wearing black jackets. What does brain training give? And look at the age of academicians of the Russian Academy of Sciences - on average 80 years. And everyone’s brains are “fresh”!..
Participates in movement planning
Participates in planning movements and exercises cognitive control over behavior - the prefrontal cortex is involved in the abstract planning of volitional movements. Thanks to this, the goal of the movement and how to achieve it are determined.
This function is realized thanks to the received multimodal sensory information and its intensive connections with many structures of the motor system. The prefrontal cortex not only plans volitional movements, but also exercises cognitive control over general human behavior.
Cognitive control is based on knowledge of what goals are possible, what tools to use to achieve them, and what the consequences of their implementation may be. The prefrontal cortex is thought to be responsible for creating the rules that govern our thoughts and actions.
When the prefrontal cortex is damaged, difficulties arise in planning and implementing goal behavior. There is no strategy to achieve the final goal, which makes people unable to organize their lives.
About sex and laziness
"AiF": - Can we say that the brain is a perfect organ?
S.S.: - What are you talking about! It is made so poorly that one is left wondering how it works. It consumes a lot of energy, the blood supply is poor, and the neurons are not restored. As soon as a person is born, brain cells begin to die. Metabolic products also accumulate inside them, which are not eliminated until old age. From a biological point of view, the brain is an ugly structure. But for evolution this doesn’t matter. For her, the transfer of the genome to the next generation is important, and for this an outstanding brain is not needed. A hairy chest and unshaven armpits are enough.
"AiF": - But didn't the brain help our ancestors survive under natural selection?
S.S.: — It’s unlikely that the selection was based on an intellectual principle. And the brain certainly did not evolve to think. Therefore, laziness is a natural trait of “homo sapiens”; it is supported by the release of endorphins, special narcotic substances. To reduce the load, it is more beneficial for the brain to turn on for a short time and then immediately turn off. It is better to have a powerful computer and use it from time to time than to constantly poke at the buttons of a calculator, which will quickly overheat. That's the logic.
In general, the nervous system (and our consciousness in particular) arose from the sexual olfactory system (in simple terms - smell. - Ed.) of reptiles. From it, during evolution, the forebrain emerged, then our ancestors climbed trees, and the sense of smell lost its functions. But, since those brain centers with which we think grew out of the reproductive system, sexual relations remained very important in our lives. They determine self-esteem, strategy, even the meaning of life.
"AiF": - Which area of the brain is responsible for sexual behavior?
S.S.: - You don’t understand? The entire brain arose and formed as a system serving this need! Therefore, sexual motivations turned out to be the basic principles of human thinking. And our aggression and, unfortunately, unreasonableness are caused precisely by this.
From the editor. Not all scientists agree with Professor Savelyev’s opinion. In the following issues we will continue the discussion on this topic.
