The cerebral cortex, especially that part customarily designated "neocortex," is one of the hallmarks of mammalian evolution and reaches its greatest size, relatively speaking, and its widest structural diversity in the human brain. The evolution of this structure, as remarkable for the huge numbers of neurons that it contains as for the range of behaviors that it controls, has been of abiding interest to many generations of neuroscientists. Yet few theories of cortical evo- lution have been proposed and none has stood the test of time. In particular, no theory has been successful in bridging...

Volume 2 of Cerebral Cortex continues our policy of dealing with the individual elements of the cerebral cortex before moving on in subsequent volumes to a consideration of the details of the various functional areas. Volume 1 of the treatise dealt with the morphology of cortical neurons, and Volume 2 continues this theme to some extent by including chapters devoted to the morphology of cortical neuroglial cells, of immunocytochemically labeled neurons, and of in- tracellularly i ected neurons. However, the major emphasis of this volume and of Volume 3, which will follow it, is on the...

This volume of the series on "Cerebral Cortex" deals with a variety of topics that need to be considered in our overall understanding of the functions of the cerebral hemispheres. Chapters in the first part of this volume deal with normal functions that were not covered in earlier volumes, while chapters in the latter part deal with the functioning of the cortex in various altered states. The first chapter is by Eberhard Fetz, Keisuke Toyama, and Wade Smith, and it considers the interactions that can be demonstrated to exist between cortical neurons by using the technique of...

The previous volumes in this series have dealt with the mature cerebral cortex. In those volumes many of the structurally and physiologically distinct areas of the cerebral cortex, their connections, the various types of neurons and neuroglial cells they contain, and the functions of those cells have been considered. In the present volume the contributions focus on the development of the neocortex and hippocampus. Chapters in this volume describe how the neurons migrate in the cortex to attain their ultimate positions, and emphasize the role played by the preexisting pallium or primordial...

Volume 6 of Cerebral Cortex is in some respects a continuation of Volume 2, which dealt with the functional aspects of cortical neurons from the physiological and pharmacological points of view. In the current volume, chapters are devoted to the catecholamines, which for a number of reasons were not represented in the earlier volume, and to acetylcholine and the neuropeptides, about which much new information has recently appeared. Volume 6 deals in part with the structure and function of cholinergic and catecholaminergic neuronal systems in the cerebral cortex and with new aspects of the...

Volume 5 of Cerebral Cortex completes the sequence of three volumes on the individual functional areas of the cerebral cortex by covering the somatosensory and motor areas. However, the chapters on these areas lead naturally to a series of others on patterns of connectivity in the cortex, intracortical and subcortical, so that the volume as a whole achieves a much broader viewpoint. The individual chapters on the sensory-motor areas reflect the considerable diversity of interest within the field, for each of the authors has given his or her chapter a different emphasis, reflecting in part...

Volume 10 is a direct continuation and extension of Volume 3 in this series, Visual Cortex. Given the impressive proliferation of papers on visual cortex over the intervening eight years, Volume 10 has specifically targeted visual cortex in primates and, even so, it has not been possible to survey all of the major or relevant developments in this area. Some research areas are experiencing rapid change and can best be treated more comprehensively in a subsequent volume; for example, elaboration of color vision; patterns and subdivisions of functional columns. One major goal of this volume has...

This volume deals with some of the association areas of the cerebral cortex and with the auditory cortex. In the first chapter, by Deepak Pandya and Edward Yeterian, the general architectural features and connections of cortical associ- ation areas are considered; as these authors point out, in primates the association areas take up a considerable portion of the total cortical surface. Indeed, it is the development of the association areas that accounts for the greatest differ- ences between the brains of primate and non primate species, and these areas have long been viewed as crucial in the...

The cerebral cortex, especially that part customarily designated "neocortex," is one of the hallmarks of mammalian evolution and reaches its greatest size, relatively speaking, and its widest structural diversity in the human brain. The evolution of this structure, as remarkable for the huge numbers of neurons that it contains as for the range of behaviors that it controls, has been of abiding interest to many generations of neuroscientists. Yet few theories of cortical evo- lution have been proposed and none has stood the test of time. In particular, no theory has been successful in bridging...

Over the last twenty-five years, there has been an extensive effort, still growing for that matter, to explore and understand the organization of extrastriate cor tex in primates. We now recognize that most of caudal neocortex is visual in some sense and that this large visual region includes many distinct areas. Some of these areas have been well defined, and connections, neural properties, and the functional consequences of deactivations have been studied. More recently, non invasive imaging of cortical activity patterns during visual tasks has led to an expanding stream of papers on...