#Different parts of brain stem function skin#

The hippocampus is also responsible for another important part of our memory, our spatial memory. Without our hippocampus we wouldn't really be able to remember new things for longer than 20 seconds. Basically, our hippocampus lets us remember things for a long time (hours, days, months, years, and even longer!). It is important for the formation of long-term memories. The hippocampus's main job is to help with our memory. The hippocampus is a long brain structure near the temporal lobe and above the brain stem. It helps balance and control our hunger, thirst, temperature, and more! The hypothalamus does a lot of behind-the-scenes things to make sure our body is functioning properly. The hypothalamus is a very small brain structure underneath the thalamus. The first stop is the thalamus, which takes that sensory information and sends it to the appropriate location in the cortex (the parietal lobe).

#Different parts of brain stem function skin#

That is why its job is so important! If the thalamus were to make a mistake in relaying information to the rest of the brain, the brain wouldn't be able to process the information.įor example, when our skin cells feel somethign cold they send information to the brain. The thalamus is sort of like the middle runner in a relay racing team, it takes the baton from the first runner and runs the baton to the next runner. The thalamus combines incoming information from all over the rest of the brain or body and sends the information to the right place in the brain. The thalamus is another important communication tool for the brain. The corpus callosum lies right in between the two hemispheres and allows them to communicate. The brain is seperated into two different hemispheres that each control a different side of the body. The corpus callosum has one very important job. The corpus callosum is a long brain structure that is located right in the middle of the brain. Try it yourself: take a piece of paper and fold it as many times as you can. Pretty impressive that something so big can fit in our heads right? Well, that is why the cerebral cortex is so folded! When you fold something over and over again, it becomes smaller. That is about as large as four sheets of paper side by side! That's thinner than a finger! If you were to unfold the cerebral cortex and lay it out flat, it could have a surface area of up to 2500 cm².

The actual cortex is a thin layer of brain cells that is about 2 - 4 millimeters thick. The size of the cerebral cortex is very interesting. When we have concious thoughts, it usually means that our cerebral cortex is doing some work. The cerebral cortex is very important for thinking. Its duties depend on which brain lobe that part of the cortex is located in. The cerebral cortex is responsible for all sorts of things. From the outside it looks like the brain is entirely made out fo this pink squishy material, but the cortex is actually covering a lot of other important brain structures. The cerebral cortex is the folded surface that covers most of the brain.