Full Description
It has been recognized for more than a thousand years that the function of the brain, like the function of the other organs of the body, is determined by its physical, chemical, and biological properties. Evidence that even its highest functions could be explained by these properties was gathered only in recent years, however; these findings, which clearly have to be confirmed by a great deal of further experimental evidence, indicate that most, if not all, of the functions of the brain are based on its bio chemical and biophysical mechanisms. This at first hearing may sound rather simple, but the ability to understand learning, emotion, perhaps even creativity, on biological terms may well be the most important scientific discovery of all time. Few pieces of knowledge can influence our future health and well-being to the degree that understanding of mental mechanisms will. It has been clearly shown in many ways in the previous volumes of this Handbook that from the biochemical or neurochemical point of view the brain is one of the most active organs. The brain seems stable and in some respects permanent; this is evidence not of inactivity but of carefully controlled homeostasis, of dynamic rather than static equilibrium, with most components undergoing metabolic alterations.
Contents
Chapter1 Chemosensory Stimulation.- Chapter2 Excitation.- Chapter3 Some Neurochemical Aspects of Convulsions.- Chapter4 Stress.- Chapter5 Chemical Alterations Produced in Brain by Environment and Training.- Chapter6 Memory.- Chapter7 Do Specific Biochemical Correlates to Learning Processes Exist in Brain Cells?.- Chapter8 Chemical Transfer of Information.- Chapter9 Undernutrition and the Developing Brain.- Chapter10 Effect of Ischemia.- Chapter11 Body Temperature and Drug Effects.- 12 Phenothiazines: Neurochemical Aspects of Their Mode of Action.- Chapter13 Reserpine: A Survey of Its Pharmacology.- Chapter14 Antidepressants and Related Drugs.- Chapter15 Lithium.- Chapter16 Anesthetics.- Chapter17 Local Anesthetics.- Chapter18 Hallucinogens.- Chapter19 Demyelinating Cholinesterase Inhibitors: Lipid and Protein Metabolism.- 20 The Alteration of Brain Metabolism by Narcotic Analgesic Drugs.- Chapter21 Alcohol.- Chapter22 Effects of Ionizing Radiation.
