Physiology - Sensory Stuff

Front 1

What does Somatic mean?

Back 1

Somatic means "of the body".

Front 2

Where are Somatic Senses located in the body?

Back 2

Somatic senses are distributed in various tissues and organs throughout the body

Front 3

What is Nociception?

Back 3

Response to detection of painful stimuli through use of mechano-, thermo- and chemoreceptors. This allows you to minimize or avoid damage to your body.

Front 4

What does Proprioception do?

Back 4

Allows you to determine your body's position in space.

Front 5

What do the special senses include? What makes these senses special?

Back 5

The Special Senses - these include vision, hearing, equilibrium, olfaction (smell), and gustation (taste).

Special senses are mediated by discreet sensory organs (e.g., the eyes)

Front 6

What are Receptor Potentials?

Back 6

Receptor Potentials: these are depolarizations produced in sensory receptor cells (which may be neurons, or could be non-neuronal cells such as taste bud cells ("taste cells").

Front 7

What is another name of receptor potentials?

Back 7

Receptor potentials are sometimes called Generator potentials

Front 8

Can an action potential happen if the threshold is passed for receptor potentials?

Back 8

Yes. Receptor Potentials may exceed threshold for action potential generation.

Front 9

Can a receptor potential be generated if a weak stimuli is detected?

How does strong stimuli affect receptor potentials?

Back 9

Weak stimuli produce small receptor potentials, and few (if any) action potentials.

Strong stimuli produce large receptor potentials, and many action potentials

Front 10

How does your brain tell how strong a stimulus is?

Back 10

Your brain can tell how strong the stimulus is by counting the number of action potentials

Front 11

What is Sensory Transduction?

Back 11

Sensory Transduction: your sensory cells are designed to detect specific features of the environment, such as heat, specific chemicals (in olfaction & gustation), sound (which is changes in air pressure), etc

**Each of these environmental features is the adequate stimulus for a specific type of sensory receptor cell**

Front 12

Why do we say transduction happens at sensory receptor cells?

Back 12

Sensory receptor cells 'transduce' their adequate stimulus into receptor potentials, and then action potentials. So, these cells are converting (i.e., transducing) something like a smell into an electrical signal.

Front 13

What are simple neural receptors?

Back 13

Simple Neural Receptors: the sensory receptor cell is a neuron, so it can fire APs in response to the adequate stimulus

Front 14

What are complex neural receptors?

Back 14

Complex Neural Receptors: the sensory receptor cell has a special structure (e.g., a Pacinian Corpusle) that increases its ability to transduce its adequate stimulus (in this case, touch)

Front 15

What are examples of special senses receptors?

Back 15

Special Senses Receptor: taste cells are epithelial cells that are specialized to detect chemical tastants. *They synapse with a sensory neuron.* Other examples are hair cells in the inner ear, and rods & cones in the retina (which are specialized neurons)

Front 16

What is a chemoreceptor? A Mechanoreceptor?

Back 16

Chemoreceptors: sensory receptor cells that are specialized to detect chemicals.

Mechanoreceptors: sensory receptor cells that are specialized to detect mechanical events such aspressure

Front 17

What is a thermoreceptor?

Back 17

Thermoreceptors: sensory receptor cells that are specialized to detect temperatures (hot & cold)

Front 18

What is a photoreceptor?

Back 18

Photoreceptors: sensory receptor cells that are specialized to detect photons (i.e., light orelectromagnetic radiation).

Front 19

What is a receptive field?

Back 19

Receptive Fields: the area of the skin that is innervated by a single primary sensory neuron.

*If three separate primary sensory neurons all CONVERVE on the same secondary sensory neuron, the brain will NOT be able to tell which of the individual primary neurons was sending the signal that something was stimulating it in its receptive field

Front 20

What is an Afferent Sensory neuron?

Back 20

Afferent (sensory) neurons: carry information from the periphery to the central nervous system

Front 21

What is an Efferent Sensory neuron?

Back 21

Efferent (motor) neurons: carry information from the CNS to the periphery.

Front 22

What is light packaged in?

Back 22

Light = photons (electromagnetic radiation)

Front 23

What stimuli allows us to detect Sound, Smell, Taste, Touch, and Temperature?

Back 23

Sound = changes in air pressure

Smells = chemicals in air

Tastes = chemicals in mouth

Touch = mechanical pressure

Temperature = heat or absence thereof

Front 24

How are Sensory Receptor Proteins related to sensory receptor cells?

Back 24

Sensory Receptor Proteins: these are DIFFERENT from Sensory Receptor CELLS! One sensory receptor cell typically has many (even 1000's) of sensory receptor proteins

Front 25

What is an Adequate Stimulus?

Back 25

Adequate stimulus: this is the feature of the environment (e.g., photons) that a particular type of sensory receptor cell is DESIGNED by nature to detect (in this case, photoreceptor cells in the retina).

Front 26

What are Auditory Hair cells?

Back 26

Hair cells are the sensory receptors of both the auditorysystem and the vestibular system in the ears of all vertebrates

Front 27

What are Vestibular hair cells?

Back 27

Not sure the difference...

Front 28

What is Sensory Adaptation?

Back 28

Neural adaptation or sensory adaptation is a change over time in the responsiveness of the sensory system to a constant stimulus

Front 29

What's the difference between

Phasic sensory receptor cells and

Tonic sensory receptor cells?

Back 29

A phasic receptor is a sensory receptor that adapts rapidly to a stimulus. The response of the cell diminishes very quickly and then stops.
A tonic receptor is a sensory receptor that adapts slowly to a stimulus and continues to produce action potentials over the duration of the stimulus.

Front 30

What is the study of Stimulus intensity coding?

Back 30

The study of neural coding involves measuring and characterizing how stimulus attributes, such as light or sound intensity, or motor actions, such as the direction of an arm movement, are represented by neuron action potentials or spikes.

Front 31

What are Golgi tendon organs?

Back 31

The Golgi organ (also called Golgi tendon organ, GTO, tendon organ) is a proprioceptive sensory receptor organ that senses changes in muscle tension