PSYC 2030 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Resting Potential, The Fluid
29 May 2018
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PSYC 2030 Lecture 13 Notes
Introduction
Instantaneous Reaction
• We measure brain activity in milliseconds (thousandths of a second) and computer
activity in nanoseconds (billionths of a second).
• Thus, unlike the nearly instantaneous reactions of a computer, your reaction to a
sudden event, such as a child darting in front of your car, may take a quarter- second or
more.
• Your brain is vastly more complex than a computer, but slower at executing simple
responses.
• And if you were an elephant
• Whose round-trip message travel time from a yank on the tail to the brain and back to
the tail is 100 times longer than that of a tiny shrew
• Your reflexes would be slower yet (More et al., 2010).
• Like batteries, neurons generate electricity from chemical events.
• I the euro’s heistr- to- electricity process, ions (electrically charged atoms) are
exchanged.
• The fluid outside a ao’s erae has ostl positiel harged sodiu ios
• A restig ao’s fluid interior has mostly negatively charged potassium ions.
• This positive outside/ negative-inside state is called the resting potential.
• Like a tightl guarded failit, the ao’s surfae is er seletie aout hat it allos
through its gates.
• We say the ao’s surfae is seletiel pereale.
• When a neuron fires, however, the security parameters change
• The first section of the axon opens its gates, rather like sewer covers flipping open, and
positively charged sodium ions flood in through the cell membrane
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