Deep Inside Your Brain

The Corpus Callosum is actually the information super highway of your brain. Remember how you have two separate hemispheres? Well this info highway, the corpus callosum, links the two. It's a huge bundle of nerves that transport messages (impulses) super fast back and forth across the bridge.

If you didn't have a corpus callosum, your hemispheres would operate independently. If that were the case, you would have a really hard time catching a ball, or finding the next line of this text when you get to the end of this line. Words would be all jumbled up because your eyes would not be moving in sync. So as you read this, there are all these impulses that are running back and forth across your corpus callosum. Cool huh?

Then there is the hypothalamus and the amygdala. These are very small and buried deep in the center of the brain.

The Hypothalamus controls thirst, hunger etc. but it also controls body temperature and emotions. The Amygdala processes your memories and acts like your emotional center. By the time you are 25 or so, you will have a lot of neural connections between your amygdala (your emotional center) and your frontal lobe (which plans, problem solves and makes decisions). This will help you understand cause and effect so that you make decisions that won't cause you harm.

And finally, there are chemicals that help all these neurons move across your brain. There are a bunch of them but we will only mention a few here. These chemicals are called Neurotransmitters. They are produced and controlled by the pituitary gland that is in your brain.

Dopamine is an important one. It makes you happy and it focuses your attention. Have you heard about people who take stimulant medication like Ritalin to help them with their attention? Well the reason they take that medication and not Advil or something else is because Ritalin or Dexedrine, is a synthetic form of dopamine.

Then there are Seratonin and Norepinephrine, which are other neurotransmitters that also help keep you happy, focused and alert.

And would you believe that what you eat could impact the levels of these neurotransmitters in your brain? Brain Food

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