Reflexes Lab

In this lab, we tested out the photo pupillary reflex, the knee jerk reflex, the blink reflex, and the babe, what's your sign reflex. We then did an activity where we tested our response time to something we see with two trials: one with texting and one without. In the notes, we learned that reflexes are rapid, predictable, and involuntary responses to stimuli. A reflex arc is a pathway to nerve impulses and they do not go to the brain. Reflexes are simply natural reactions we are all born with and they are a sign that your body is healthy. Neurons are highly specialized to transmit messages from one part of the body to another.

Claim Evidence Reasoning

Part 1: Photopupillary Reflex

Claim: When the intensity of the light entering the eye increases, a photopupillary reflex is triggered, and the colliery body of the iris is stimulated to contract. We observed that the pupil decreased in size  and less light entered the eye.

Evidence: In our experiment, I covered my eye with my hands for two minutes and then after, shined a flashlight close to one eye. We observed the pupil and played close attention to the size. We saw that the size of the pupil decreased, and less light entered the eye.

Reasoning: This reflex occurred because the photopupillary reflex is triggered when the intensity of the light entering the eye increases.

Part 2: Knee Jerk Reflex

Claim: The knee jerk reflex is a 2 neuron reflex arc. The reflex goes from sensory neuron to spinal cord to motor neuron to the knee. The knee jerk reflex is also called a monosynaptic reflex because there is only one synapse in the circuit needed to complete the reflex. We observed t hat when Michelle hit my knee at a certain spot near my knee cap, my leg kicked out;

Evidence: In our experiment, Michelle hit my knee at a spot just below the knee cap. On my first try, my leg did not kick out, but after several tries, it finally worked. I think that our problem at first was that we did not hit the right place, but soon figured out our mistake.

Reasoning: The tap below the knee causes the thigh muscle to stretch. Information is then send to the spinal cord. After one synapse in the ventral horn of the spinal cord, the information is sent back out to the muscle.

Part 3: Blind Reflex

Claim: The Blind reflex is the automatic closure of the eyelid when an object is perceived as coming to rapidly to the eye. We observed that I did blink as a cotton ball was thrown at me.

Evidence: I stood behind a see-through barrier and Michelle through a cotton ball at me, and I did the same to her after. We both blinked every time the cotton ball was thrown over, which shows that the blink reflex did work properly for both of us.

Reasoning: People blink typically 15 times per minute, and this reflex really does protect the cornea from dying out and from contact with foreign objects. This reflex response is initiated by sensory stimuli that activate afferent neurons.

Part 4: Babe, what's your sign

Claim: The plantar reflex is used as an important neurological test. It is initiated when the sole of the food is stimulated with a blunt instrument. Our claim is that as a result, our toes did flex and move closer together, which shows that this reflex was functioning properly.

Evidence: In this test, I sat on the table and took my shoes and socks off of one food. Michelle took a pen with a cap on it and firmly grade the pen up the sole of the food from the heel to the base of the big toe. As a result, we observed that the toes flexed and moved closer together.

Reasoning: This response occurred because the plantar reflex was working properly in each of our bodies. This reflex was a response that occurred when the body receives a certain stimuli. However, if there is nerve damage one might show Babinski's sign, where the toes spread apart and upward.

Part 5: How Fast are You?

This activity is designed to measure response time to something that you see. In this test, we took a ruler and helped is near the end with the highest number and let is hang down. We had another person put his or her hand at the bottom of the ruler and have them ready to grab the ruler. We recorded the level at which we each caught the ruler. We had three trials and took the average time (used table to convert the distance to time).
This reaction time experiment required visual information to travel to the brain. Then our brain sent a motor command to the muscles of your arm and hand.
My average time was 0.18 seconds and Michelle's average time was 0.15 seconds.

We repeated the test again, except this time we texted while doing it. We observed that our reaction time was dramatically reduced.

My average time without texting was 0.18 seconds but my average time with texting was 0.42 seconds, which shows that texting did have a huge effect on my time.

Table:

Data while texting

Data without texting

Table: Class Data

This test showed us that texting can severely decrease reaction rate. This therefore shows that texting while driving is very dangerous and it is a huge distraction. This is a major reason so many people die in car accidents. Texting changed the reaction rate.

In this picture, we are doing the "How Fast Are You?" Test

My Brain Map

To complete this assignment, I used a website called Your Brain Map ( Brain Map) where I got  to observe the different parts of the brain and their different functions/interesting facts.

An interactive infographic by Open Colleges

Cerebral Cortex

1. What do the frontal lobes do?

The frontal lobe controls your personality, but it's also where problem solving, memory, judgement, and impulse control occur. The frontal lobe executes your behavior. The left side of the lobe deals with "language based" while the right side of the brain involves processes that don't require language.

1. What is the relationship between selective attention and learning?

Selective Attention shows that your intelligence levels depend on how selective you are when remembering information. It makes your working memory capacity greater as it allows you to prioritize important, organ used information above unimportant, little used information. Many people think that 'more facts' in your brain equals 'more intelligence' but this is not the case. It is more about how you control the spotlight of your intelligence. 

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

The frontal lobe is the last part of your brain to develop and it will be the first to deteriorate with age. There are exercises you can do to prevent your frontal lobe from deteriorating.

1. What does the neo cortex do?

The neo cortex helps you to navigate your body. It governs your senses, spatial awareness, and motor skills.

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

The pre frontal cortex controls your personality, including how you behave in social situations. It organizes your thought and actions to match cohesively with your internal goals. 

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

The prefrontal cortex has a "central bottleneck" which is there to prevent you from doing more than two major things at one time. Despite what you are often told, multitasking does not really exist as your brain is really just jumping from one last to another quickly, often meaning that the quality of the tasks you complete is inferior.

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

Broca's Area is responsible for speech production, language comprehension, interpreting the actions of others and your speech associated gestures. There have been instances where tumors have occurred in people in this part of the brain but they were still able to speak, suggesting that in these cases language skills may have been shifted to other nearby parts of the brain.

1. Which part of your brain is responsible for thinking the following: “Is it hot in here or is it just me?”
2. What does your visual cortex do for you?

The Somatosensory Cortex is responsible for thinking "is it hot in here or is it just me?" 

The Visual Cortex helps differentiate colors and distinguish complex things such as faces. Without this all your friends and teachers would look the same. 

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

The Occipital Lobe is your brain's processing center. It collects and categorizes visual data. It also deals with your imagination and allows you to process short and long term memories. This part of the brain allows you to register the contexts of me and you and now and then.

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

Without this part of the brain, you might forget where you parked your car to get to class, or where the bus stops is: you'd ha e to take a map everyday!

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

I could not find the answer to this question, but I am guessing that it is part of the brain which carries out roles quickly? 

Neuron

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

Exercise and a healthy diet provide many benefits for your brain to function. Omega fatty acids help benefit brain function, particularly as these affect the brain's synapses. Eating these fatty acids (ex: fish) can improve the functioning of your synapses. Socializing is also a factor in healthy brain function.

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

Dendritic spines are moveable protrusions of the neuron's dendrite. Their lifespan is influenced by your experience which is laid down by your input activity. This means multiple stimulations mean you will have a better memory. If you engage multiple regions of your brain in storing data about a particular subject, there will be more opportunities for your brain to pull up data from multiple sources. This cross referencing of data stored in your brain may convert the new knowledge from something you have memorized to something you have learned. This concept is known as multi modal learning.

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

Studies show that you need to use 'big picture thinking' to fully comprehend a subject, and then break the subject down into its relevant parts. Learning should be structured around real problems as this helps put 'you' (the learner) into the context and information being examined. Many people find success when employing mnemonic devices to learn. It is a learning technique where you try to remember a personal, humorous, spatial or relatable information about a topic in order to recall it, rather than focusing on abstract facts.

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

Glutamine plays a key role in how you learn. Glutamate is vital to long term potentiation, a strengthening of the synapses, which is a way that scientists explain the formation of long term memories. Glutamine is essential for our brain functioning to study, particularly as it deals with learning and memory.

Limbic System

1. What does the corpus callosum do?

Corpus Callosum deals with cognitive, motor, and sensory functions between the two hemispheres. Your corpus callous is where you get your oral language skills and your ability to comprehend how language is structured. It is also involved in reading, dealing with the concepts of print, handwriting and the movement of your eyes.

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

Research has indicated that studying music can help to strengthen the conversation between the two hemispheres of your brain. Musical practice was found to improve the function between the two hands.

1. Why is the thalamus important?

Thalamus is responsible for motor control, sensory information and states of consciousness such as alertness and sleep. It also deals with your memory, your emotions, your consciousness, awareness and attention.

Relate and Review 

Summarize what you learned from this tutorial.  Relate what you learned to your everyday life and how you can make it better.  Use at least 5 of the bolded words from the questions.  5-sentence minimum. You may use the back of this if needed.


This tutorial was really helpful because it helped me learn the limbic system, cerebral cortex, and neurons. The complete functioning of the brain is vital to people's lives. If some parts of the brain aren't working, it is very detrimental and can lead to death of many problems in the future. I found it very interesting that exercise and a healthy diet can improve brain functioning because I did not know that being healthy affected the brain function. This tutorial helped me understand many essential parts of the brain. For example, the Thalamus is responsible for motor control, sensory information and states of consciousness such as alertness and sleep. It also deals with your memory, your emotions, your consciousness, awareness and attention. Your Corpus Callosum deals with cognitive, motor, and sensory functions between the two hemispheres. Your corpus callous is where you get your oral language skills and your ability to comprehend how language is structured. My mom's friend has a damaged temporal lobe, and I previously did not know what this meant. Now I know that without this part of the brain, you might forget where you parked your car to get to class, or where the bus stops is: you'd ha e to take a map everyday! The frontal lobe is also very important because it controls your personality, but it's also where problem solving, memory, judgement, and impulse control occur. The Occipital Lobe is your brain's processing center. It collects and categorizes visual data. The brain is very complex, and this tutorial helped me understand the key roles of each part of the brain. This assignment related to the clay brain because in the clay brain, we made the brain out of clay to understand the anatomy of the brain. In this assignment, we got to understand more about the anatomy but also got to understand the physiology of the brain.

Brain Dissection

In this lab, we dissected a sheep brain and identified the different parts of the brain; in particular, the cerebrum, cerebellum, brain stem, thalamus, optic nerve, medulla oblongata, pons, midbrain, corpus callous, hypothalamus, gray matter, and white matter. We made two cuts on the brain; first we cut it in half longitudinally so that we could observe the medial plane of the brain. Then we made a cross sectional cut of the cerebrum which allowed us to see the gray matter and white matter more distinctly. We did notes on the brain structure, so this lab was a good follow up to understand more about the physiology and anatomy of the brain and how they work together. We learned in the notes that the parts of the brain are the cerebrum, diencephalon, brainstem, and cerebellum. In this lab, we got to visually see the cerebrum, cerebellum, and brain stem.

Table of Functions:

Question 1: Sketch of Brain / Picture of Brain

Sketch of Brain parts

Blue pin is the brain stem. Green pin is the cerebellum. Yellow Pin is the Cerebrum. White pin is the anterior part of brain and black pin is the posterior part of brain.

Question 2: Functions of each of the structures

Question 3: What is the function of myelin in a neuron?

The myelin sheet is very essential to the proper functioning of the nervous system. When the myelin is not functioning properly, nerve impulses slow down and begins to shrivel. A disease that result from damaged myelin sheath is sclerosis. The myelin sheath increases the speed at which impulses spread along the myelinated fiber.

Question 4: Sketch of Cross-Section / Picture of Cross Section

Sketch of Important Brain Parts

This is a picture showing the specific parts of the brain visible in the medial brain. To identify the structures, look at the table of functions above.

Question 5: Functions of Structures

Question 6: Detailed Sketch/Picture of Cross Section with Gray Matter and White Matter

Sheep Eye Dissection Analysis

I worked with Mary and Eric in this lab, so we have the same pictures:)

The eye contains many important parts that have to work together to produce clear vision. In this lab, we dissected a sheep eye and identified the different parts of the eye and how they all worked together (aka we observed the Anatomy and Physiology of the Eye)

The sclera is the white outer coat of the eye that protects the eye from injury because it is very tough (observed by feeling  the sclera in the eye). It also serves as an attachment for muscles that move the eye. 

The cornea is the transparent part of the sclera so you can see. It begins the light focusing process and does not contain any blood vessels. It receives nutrients from the aqueous humor. 

We noticed that the eye was covered with fat, which we did not expect. It took us a long time to peel off all the fat from the sheep eye.

Identified in the picture is the external eye muscle. It controls the movement of the eyeball and directs the eye to a point of interest. 

The vitreous humor is a large gel like portion of the eyeball that occupies the space behind the lens and in front of the retina at the back of the eye.

The Retina is located near the optic nerve and it receives light that the lens has focused and converts it into neural signals which it sends on to the brain for processing. It looks like a thin layer of tissues.

The Choroid lies between the retina and sclera and provides nourishment for the back of the eye. The choroid is interesting because there are pigment cells within the choroid that absorb stray light.

The Blind Spot is a small portion of the visual field of each eye.

The lens is important because it is involved in changing the focal distance of the eye so that it can focus on objects at various distances. The lens changes shape.

The Ciliary Body  produces and secretes aqueous humor that is essential to regulate the pressure within the eye. It contains muscles that act on the crystalline lens to change its shape and shift the focus of the eye from far to near. The Ciliary Body has two portions called the pars plicate and the pars plana.




The suspensory ligament of the eyeball functions to support the eye and prevents downward displacement of the eyeball



The iris is the colored part of the eye that controls light levels inside the eye. The pupil os the round opening in the center of the iris. The size of the pupil determines the amount of light that enters the eye.

Below is a picture of all the parts of the eye clearly identified in one picture. Notice that this is a human eye.

Bringing More Awareness to Important Organizations/Charities

I have learned a lot about the different organizations and charities that are tying to help make people's lives better and easier. This week, I decided to make a website where I describe and list the different charities that most people are unaware of, so hopefully people can realize the significance to donate to these organizations. It was very interesting to research different charities for children because I was not aware of mostly all of them and now I feel that I know more about all these charities. I have learned that I used to not really care about learning all the organizations and donating to more charities, but now I know that helping others is important. In other poorer countries, people live much harder lives and these organizations help them, so I learned that life for me is definitely not as hard what others are going through, so I need to help bring more awareness so other people can realize how important donating is. I also started to make charms of pencils to raise more money for Pencils of Promise, which I plan to sell sometime this month.

I have had a lot of setbacks. For example, it took me a really long to make the charm, but after a lot of practice, I finally got it. The next step in my process is continuing to lengthen my website and sell my charms to people.  I was thinking of selling my charms to patients at my mom's work. I can apply what I have learned to my community because in Saratoga, life is easy and we don't have to worry about getting enough food for the family; our priorities are nothing compared to the people in other countries who are dying of starvation. I think our community needs to realize how important it is to help others in their community and also outside.
This is my website so far:
Charities/Organizations Weebly

The Clay Brain

To make the clay brain, we used play-doh to make a model of the brain and the different parts of the brain. It was a 2-d brain, so we used cardboard for a template to put the brain on. I really liked this activity because it helped me understand the brain parts more. We made two models of the brain: one on the left hemisphere from the right looking at the sagittal plane and the other was a lateral view of the right cerebral hemisphere.

"The Woman with a hole in her Brain" Analysis

This article talked about a rare occasion where a woman is alive without a cerebellum in her brain. The cerebellum's main job is to control voluntary movements and balance and also is involved in our ability to learn specific motor actions and speak. If the cerebellum is not functioning properly, it can lead to severe mental impairment and movement disorders. However, the woman he was missing her cerebellum only summered mild to moderate motor deficiency. This is important because it highlights the remarkable plasticity of the brain. The brain is a very complex organ, and it is interesting to understand how the brain circuity works and compensates for missing arts. This article is not relatable to a lot of people because there are few people in the world who live without their cerebellum and survive their early years of life. This article relates to what we are learning because we are learning about the different parts of the brain and their functions; this article teaches us the importance of the cerebellum and its function.  

The Frontal Lobe is the front part of the brain that is involved in planning, organizing, problem solving, and selective attention. The Frontal lobe is considered our emotional control center and home to our personality. 

You can technically live without a front lobe, but you would have paralysis of motor control and cognitive abilities. You would not be able to have any reasoning skills and form simple thoughts. You also would not be able to move. Frontal lobe damage can lead to lack of initiation and movement, memory loss, sequencing difficulties, behavior changes, distractibility, and reduced attention and concentration. No other parts of the brain could take over.