Word: braine
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LATE CHILDHOOD 5-10 yrs. Dramatic growth spurts in the temporal and parietal lobes, brain regions crucial to language and understanding of spatial relations, make this a prime time for learning new languages and music...
...scans represent a major advance over the simple X ray, which did not allow doctors to visualize brain tissue at all. Instead of a flat, two-dimensional X-ray picture, CT scanners produce a series of successive images. Taken as the patient, lying down, moves through a scanning ring, these "slices" can be combined to create the illusion of depth. The resulting pictures of bone and soft tissue can help doctors distinguish between patients with a psychiatric disorder and those with head trauma (which can trigger similar symptoms). CTs have been particularly useful in identifying schizophrenia patients. In the 1970s...
...energy as patients are exposed to various radiofrequencies. Unlike CT views, MRIs can be rendered in full 3-D because MRI machines can slice along three or more planes, not just one. A computer can then compile the information to generate a sort of relief map of the brain, left, depicting even the smallest brain structures (for example, the brain's center for emotion, the amygdala, in yellow, is deeply buried but visible). Using MRIs, scientists have learned that the brains of schizophrenics, above right, are smaller than those of people without the disease, above left, and that they have...
CONCEPTION TO BIRTH PRENATAL The brain and nervous system develop and form an intricate network. But genetic errors and environmental factors like fetal exposure to alcohol or drugs can make this process go awry. Some common examples...
INFANCY 0-5 yrs. Excess neurons and synapses are pruned in the first 18 months, but the brain keeps growing, reaching 90% of adult size. Brain cells become more adept at communicating; babies learn to talk...