Wiktionary
n. (context neuroanatomy English) The grey, folded, outermost layer of the cerebrum that is responsible for higher brain processes such as sensation, voluntary muscle movement, thought, reasoning, and memory.
WordNet
n. the layer of unmyelinated neurons (the gray matter) forming the cortex of the cerebrum [syn: cerebral mantle, pallium, cortex]
Wikipedia
The cerebral cortex is the cerebrum's ( brain) outer layer of neural tissue in humans and other mammals. It is divided into two cortices, along the sagittal plane: the left and right cerebral hemispheres divided by the medial longitudinal fissure. The cerebral cortex plays a key role in memory, attention, perception, awareness, thought, language, and consciousness. The human cerebral cortex is thick.
In large mammals, the cerebral cortex is folded, giving a much greater surface area in the confined volume of the skull. A fold or ridge in the cortex is termed a gyrus (plural gyri) and a groove or fissure is termed a sulcus (plural sulci). In the human brain more than two-thirds of the cerebral cortex is buried in the sulci.
The cerebral cortex is composed of gray matter, consisting mainly of cell bodies (with astrocytes being the most abundant cell type in the cortex as well as the human brain in general) and capillaries. It contrasts with the underlying white matter, consisting mainly of the white myelinated sheaths of neuronal axons. The most recent part of the cerebral cortex to develop in the evolutionary history of mammals is the neocortex (also called isocortex), which differentiated into six horizontal layers; the more ancient part of the cerebral cortex, the hippocampus, has at most three cellular layers. Neurons in various layers connect vertically to form small microcircuits, called cortical columns. Different neocortical regions known as Brodmann areas are distinguished by variations in their cytoarchitectonics ( histological structure) and functional roles in sensation, cognition and behavior.
Cerebral Cortex is a scientific journal in the neuroscience area focusing on the cerebral cortex. It is published by Oxford University Press and founded by Patricia Goldman-Rakic.
Usage examples of "cerebral cortex".
However, it will not detect a tumor in any part of the brain but the cerebral cortex.
He had taught the rats to run complex mazes and then removed various chunks of cerebral cortex to see if he could find the locus of memory storage for the maze.
He felt the beginnings of a powerful flow of energy in his cerebral cortex and somewhere deep inside his brain stem.
An ancient robot named Giskard gave me limited sway over the neural complexities of the human cerebral cortex.
The human cerebral cortex added mass, stacking new circuitry atop older wiring.
I've got fibers running up my spine right into my cerebral cortex.
This will provide the unique opportunity of making connections to virtually every part of his cerebral cortex.
What he could see seemed to be superficial, in the cerebral cortex rather than deeper in the nerve fibers of the white matter.
Völgyesi talks about the ‘law of point reflexes’, which states that any monotonously repeated stimulus of the same point in the cerebral cortex produces compulsive sleepiness.