Basic brain neuroscience and pathophysiology

Abstract: This chapter offers a basic approach to brain functional organization and the pathophysiology of brain injury. The operation of intrinsic connectivity networks in the cerebral cortex and their modulation by projections from specific nuclear systems in the brainstem’s reticular core are examined. The chapter then reviews mechanisms involved in precipitating the spatial distribution of different types of focal and diffuse brain injury. The immediate primary postinjury effects of mechanical tissue disruption and secondary pathodynamics that are subsequently precipitated are then considered.