Homework 1 (20 pts)
This problem set is due Tuesday (9/6/2016) at 5pm. Please turn in your work by uploading to Canvas. If you have questions, please post them on the course forum, rather than emailing the course staff. This will allow other students with the same question to see the response and any ensuing discussion. The goal of this problem set is to review the concept that complex operations involve distributed action in the brain and to think about how best we can understand the process of cortical computaiton.
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Organization of the brain - short answer (a few sentences, 5 pts) In the 1860s, Pierre Paul Broca described how patients with lesions in the posterior left frontal lobe (what is now called “Broca’s area”) were capable of understanding language but not speaking.
How do the symptoms of lesions in Wernicke’s area differ from those in Broca’s area?
What happens to deaf patients ability to communicate in sign language when they suffer damage to Broca’s or Wernicke’s areas?
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The Stroop Effect (5 pts) Please take the Stroop effect test at http://www.math.unt.edu/~tam/SelfTests/StroopEffects.html. What was your performance time for the congruent and incongruent samples? What factors do you think might affect your performance? How do you think you could improve? For full credit, record your answer on the Canvas HW1-Stroop Effect Survey.
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The MindScope Projet (10 pts) Read this recent paper describing the Allen Institute’s MindScope Project: “Inferring cortical function in the mouse visual system through large-scale systems neuroscience” Hawrylycz et al PNAS 2016 (PDF).
In the mammal, what are the primary three regions in which visual input is processed? Which is the most complex? How many different kinds of neurons are there in mouse visual cortex?
The “overarching goal of Mindscope is to understand the operations and the flexibility of cortical tissue in the mouse by comprehensively recording and analyzing cellular-level cortical responses.” At what levels is this project investigating the mouse visual nervous system? At which of these levels do you think they have the best chance of achieving their goal?