Quotes About Prefrontal

At such rare times you can feel the electrically charged neurons of the prefrontal brain realigning themselves like iron fillings drawn by a magnet.

testosterone increases the excitability of amygdaloid neurons, and glucocorticoids decrease excitability of prefrontal cortical neurons.

We have this thin layer of prefrontal cortex made just for us, sitting on top of this big animal brain. Getting this thin little layer to handle more is unrealistic." The prefrontal cortex doesn't control most of the decisions we make every day. We can't fundamentally get more out of that unique, thin layer of prefrontal cortex. "It's already overtaxed,

The limbic system explodes during puberty, but the prefrontal cortex keeps maturing for another 10 years.

Phineas Gage's case is not the only important historical source in the effort to understand the neural basis of reasoning and decision making...[to understand the effect of] prefrontal damage. ... The Hebb-Penfield and Ackerly-Benton shared a number of personality traits...They are bereft of a theory of their own mind and of the mind of those with whom they interact

Phineas Gage's case is not the only important historical source in the effort to understand the neural basis of reasoning and decision making...[to understand the effect of] prefrontal damage. ... The Hebb-Penfield and Ackerly-Benton shared a number of personality traits...One way of describing their predicament is by saying that they never construct an appropriate theory about their persons.

With the prefrontal cortex down-regulated, most impulse control mechanisms go offline too. For people who aren't used to this combination, the results can be expensive.

The general view that prefrontal and parietal networks are required for conscious perceptual experiences is supported by studies of patients as they begin to recover from coma.157 They first transition to a vegetative state in which the brain stem and basal forebrain networks of arousal are functionally active, but the frontal and parietal networks are not. Although

Morgan then examined the effects of PFCVM lesions in rats and found that, again, the animals could not stop freezing in response to the CS. It was as if removal of PFCVM influences resulted in an out-of-control amygdala, one that responded to stimuli that were, objectively speaking, no longer threatening. This immediately suggested that the type of unregulated fear and anxiety that occurs in people with anxiety disorders might involve some dysregulation of prefrontal-amygdala circuits. It

Attentional amplification of sensory awareness in any sensory medium is achieved by top-down signals from prefrontal cortex that modulate activity of single neurons in sensory brain areas in the absence of any sensory stimulation and significantly increase baseline activity in the corresponding target region.

Indeed, brain scans done by scientists at Washington University in St. Louis indicate that areas used to recall memories are the same as those involved in simulating the future. In particular, the link between the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the hippocampus lights up when a person is engaged in planning for the future and remembering the past.

When we force a smile, we activate facial muscles with our prefrontal cortex. But when we smile because we are in a good mood, our nerves are controlled by our limbic system, which activates a slightly different set of muscles. Our brains can tell the subtle difference between the two, which was beneficial for our evolution.)

I theorize that humans are different from animals because we understand time. We have temporal consciousness in addition to spatial and social consciousness. The latest part of the brain to evolve is the prefrontal cortex, which lies just behind our forehead. It is constantly running simulations of the future.

For example, all of us talk to ourselves silently. When we do, the left brain, which controls language, consults the prefrontal cortex. But in schizophrenics, we now know, the left brain activates without permission from the prefrontal cortex

Evolution has meant that our prefrontal lobes are too small, our adrenal glands are too big, and our reproductive organs apparently designed by committee; a recipe which, alone or in combination, is very certain to lead to some unhappiness and disorder.

humans the prefrontal cortex takes up a larger ratio of the brain's top layer, the neocortex, than in any other species, and has been the site of the major evolutionary changes that make us human. This neural zone, as we will see, holds the seeds of awakening to enduring well-being, but it is also entwined with emotional suffering. We can envision wonderful possibilities, and we also can be disturbed by worrisome

Such heuristics determine whether a flood of data offers up a "Eureka!" or we suffer from information overload. That decision (Got it! versus Too much information) emanates from a thin strip in the brain's prefrontal area, the dorsolateral circuits.

Since the striosomes receive projections primarily from the emotional centers of the limbic system and the matrisomes receive projections from the higher cognitive centers of the prefrontal cortex, together they provide the perfect mechanism of integrating the messages of the heart with those of the mind.

Training in rapid acoustic discrimination can apparently induce the left prefrontal cortex, which is normally attuned to fast-changing acoustic stimuli but is disrupted in dyslexics, to do its job. The region, even in adults, remains plastic enough...to develop such differential sensitivity after intensive training, the scientists concluded.

While many different animal species have nervous systems that enable anticipation of events—for example, learning that a flashing light is associated with a reward in a conditioned learning experiment—planning for the future seems to be a prefrontal invention.