Huntington's Disease Huntington's disease, or Huntngton's chorea, is a genetic disease that causes selective neural cell death, which results in chorea, or irregular, jerking movements of the limbs caused by involuntary muscle contractions, and dementia. It can cause a lack of concentration and depression. It also may cause atrophy of the caudate nucleus, a part of the brain. However, symptoms vary between individuals, with some sufferers showing symptoms that others do not. Those suffering from
Disease Summary Huntington’s disease is of great concern because it is a genetic disease that affects many people worldwide. Huntington’s is described by Wider and Luthi-Carter (2006) as the most prevalent inherited neurodegenerative disorder in humans, affecting between two to eight per 100,000 inhabitants of Western countries. Huntington’s also has a slow onset with an average age of onset around 40 (Wider & Luthi-Carter, 2006). Wider and Luthi-Carter (2006) note the cause of this disease to be
is this increased dopamine that is believed to be responsible for the symptoms of the disease. However, the is much debate in the scientific community as to the exact mechanism by which altered dopamine levels, especially in the prefrontal cortex, striatum, and limbic system, produce schizophrenia. There is much clinical evidense that provides support for the dopamine hypothesis. The first evidense that dopamine may be involved in schizophrenia came from amphetamine users. Amphetamines work by causing
Food addiction: A brief overview A current and major growing threat to the worldwide public health is the obesity epidemic. One proposal for certain types of obesity, such as those associated with binge eating disorder is that the individual suffers from a food addiction. A food addiction can be described as compulsive overeating by an individual and their lack of control of their food intake. The purpose of this paper is to describe the neurobiological bases of food addiction and how this relates
The concentration of acetylcholine in the striatum is preserved but in those with dementia, acetylcholine content in the cerebral cortex is decrease, probably as a result of loss of neurons in the substantia innominata. Moreover, demented patients with parkinson’s disease like those with alzheimer’s
Pornography, Affect On Brain, Negative, and Addiction Pornography’s Negative And Addictive Affect On The Brain Jon Caplan Mass College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences According to a news article published by Fox News and written by Tia Ghose, Playboy magazine, an adult magazine offering pornographic images of ladies, will no longer be including pictures of naked women in their publications. Though the decision was made mostly due to the uprise in Internet pornography providing an easier, more
are capable of influencing this usual thalamic tonic inhibition – the indirect pathway and the direct pathway. The direct pathway flows from the cerebral cortex to the striatum to the internal segment of the globus pallidus, which synapses with the thalamus. The indirect pathway takes a similar route, but first detours from the striatum to the external segment of the globus pallidus, then the subthalamic nucleus, and then back to the internal segment of the globus pallidus. The net effect of the transient
Modafinil is a wake-promoting drug that has been prescribed for conditions such as sleep disorders, stimulant dependence, and attention deficit disorder [6]. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration classifies modafinil as a Schedule IV drug [2]. The official website for Drug Enforcement Agency states that Schedule IV drugs have low potential for abuse and minimal risk for dependency [5]. However, off-label use of modafinil is becoming widespread. The drug has received some media scrutiny due to
Role of Protein kinase CK2 in Central Nervous System Role of the CK2 in the CNS is not fully understood but CK2 appears to play an important role memory and learning (Girault, Hemmings et al. 1990) . CK2 is present and widely distributed in human and is essential for cell survival. It does not appear to be oncogenic by itself, but it acts as a suppressor of apoptosis and elevated levels have been associated proliferation and growth in normal and cancer cells (Ahmad, Wang et al. 2005). Limbic
Parkinson Disease There exists a group of people who live the final years of their lives in glass boxes. They are perfectly capable of seeing outside, but incapable of reaching out to the world around them. Their emotions can not be shown through facial expression, and as their condition continues, speech also becomes difficult or even impossible. These people are men and women of all races and geographical areas, constituting one percent of the world’s population over 50 years old. Parkinson
Multitasking negatively affects learning. MORE. Foerde, Knowlton, and Poldrack (2006) observed the effects of distraction on learning. In the study, 14 participants aged 18 to 45 years old predicted the weather based on a sequence of color cues during the single task condition (ST). During the dual task condition (DT), participants also heard high and low-pitched tones and kept count of the high tones. During the ST and DT, the participants’ brains were scanned using fMRI. The participants were
Nurse’s play a very important role in the delivery of care to an older person and in complex disease such as Parkinson’s disease, the care provided by a nurse is vital for both the patient and the family of the affected person. The aim of this essay is to understand briefly about Parkinson’s disease and associated issues and the role of the nurse in the management of the condition. Parkinson’s disease is a chronic, progressive neurodegenerative disorder characterised by resting tremor, slowed movements
information is thought to be sent to the orbitalfrontal cortex through the ventral striatum. Then in the orbitalfrontal cortex processes the information and helps in the decision making. The experimenters in this present study hypothesized that the youths with conduct disorder or oppositional defiance disorder would have damage in some part of the system, either in the amygdale, orbitalfrontal cortex, or the ventral striatum that connects the two. The experimenters decided to test their theory with a passive
dopamine neurotransmitter. For example, smoking cigarette shows similar characteristics with other drug use that dopamine releasing is facilitated by nicotine in the ventral striatum which is responsible brain’s reward circuitry (Jasinska et. al., 2014). In addition to cigarette smoking, dopamine releases in the ventral striatum affect other types of addictions such as obesity and pathological gambling (As cited in Jasinska et. al., 2014). Basically, researcher emphasized midbrain is holding dopamine
The National Academy Of Sciences Of The United States Of America,108(37), 15037-15042. doi:10.1073/pnas.1010654108 Volkow, N., Wang, G., Telang, F., Fowler, J., Logan, J., Childress, A., & ... Wong, C. (2006). Cocaine cues and dopamine in dorsal striatum: mechanism of craving in cocaine addiction. The Journal Of Neuroscience: The Official Journal Of The Society For Neuroscience, 26(24), 6583-6588.
task and to assess this is altered in schizophrenic patients. Functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to study the volunteers. They performed a phonologic verbal fluency test which effects the prefrontal, insular, and cingulate cortex; the striatum, and the thalamus (Hutchinson, 1999). Impaired performance will be seen in these areas of the brain in patients with schizophrenia. Eighty Five subjects participated, forty four healthy volunteers (eighteen who were 9-repeat carriers and 26 who were
In this article called, "The New Science Behind Your Spending Addition", by Sharon Begley and Jean Chatzky, they explain about the vice versa of immediate gratification versus delayed gratification and why more people tend to attract to immediate gratification. Begley and Chatzky expound on how humans choose to spend rather than save. Some people may call it "The American Quirk". Begley and Chatzky apply a short story about a father name, Leonard Green who is a professor of psychology at Washington
Memory has many functions in animals and humans. Without memory, animals and humans would not survive (Henke, 2010). The main idea of evolutionary psychology is that the structures in the brain that are responsible for memory are similar to one another (Nairne, 2010). It is likely that memory systems evolved due to pressures or problems that our ancestors faced (Nairne, 2010). This suggests that memory mechanisms probably come from solving problems in the environment our ancestors once lived in (Nairne
that showed sexually explicit images affect the brain the same way as alcohol or drugs. Dr. Voon discovered that when exposed to these images the pleasure center of the brain known as the ventral striatum is activated, and stimulated the same way it will when an alcoholic sees a drink. The Ventral striatum, a subcortical structure of the brain is known for emotional and behavioral function which makes it a very important part of the brain, if compromised in any way it could lead to mental problems
and evolution of the FOXP2 gene. Function Although it is usually associated with language, FOXP2 expressions is not limited to brain regions (Preuss,2012.pg.10711). FOXP2 is a protein that, “is expressed in the perisylvian cortical region, the striatum, cortex of the frontal and occipital pole, thalamus, cerebellum, brainstem, and a wide variety of tissues other than the brain” (Preuss,2012. pg.10711). Its actual location of the gene is on chromosome