NEUR 2600 Lecture Notes - Drosophila Melanogaster, Neuron Doctrine, Human Brain
Document Summary
The building blocks of the nervous system, its neurons, are similar in all animals that have a nervous system. The addition of more neurons is related to behavior becoming more complex. Caused by chromosome 21, results in learning impairments, alzheimer like changes in the brain, earlier death, distinctive features. Put an extra chromosome in a fruit fly and observing abnormalities in the fruit fly and manipulate gene by gene and discover what it is that produces this disorder, you can do genetic modifications to stop it. A wide variety of animals are used to research, including humans. Fruit fly, california sea slug, zebra finches (complicated songs), mice and monkeys. Each one has a particular way of answering a question that a scientist wants to answer. Take these cells and stain them (talked about later) C elegans has 302 neurons of some 900 cells. Take what you know about neurons and apply it to other animals.
