Until recent advents in neuroimaging, the brain had been inaccessible to in vivo visualization, short of neurosurgical procedures or some unfortunate traumatic exposure. It is a tribute to the early contributors to clinical neuroscience that through what, by today's standards, would be deemed extremely crude measure ments, advancements in understanding brain function were made. For example, the theories of higher cortical functions of the brain by Aleksandr Luria or Hans-Lukas Teuber in the 1950s were essentially based on military subjects who sustained traumatic head wounds during World War II. These researchers could inspect the patient and determine where penetrating entrance and exit wounds were on the head; sometimes they had skull films to identify entrance and exit fracture wounds, sometimes neurosurgical reports were available, and Luria even had the opportunity to acutely examine some patients with exposed wounds. Thus, one would take whatever information might be available and infer what regions of the brain were involved but could never actually visualize the brain. Of course, this changed dramatically with the introduction of brain imag ing in the 1970s, but it really was not until the 1990s that analysis and image display technologies finally caught up with the basic brain-imaging methods of computerized tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

This issue of Neuroimaging Clinics of North America focuses on Functional Connectivity, and is edited by Dr. Jay Pillai. Articles will include: Applications of rs-fMRI to presurgical mapping: sensorimotor mapping; Dynamic functional connectivity methods; Machine learning applications to rs-fMRI analysis; Frequency domain analysis of rs-fMRI; Applications of rs-fMRI to epilepsy; Data-driven analysis methods for rs-fMRI; Applications of rs-fMRI to presurgical mapping: language mapping; Limitations of rs-fMRI in the setting of focal brain lesions; Applications of rs-fMRI to neuropsychiatric disease; Applications of rs-fMRI to Traumatic Brain Injury; Applications of rs-fMRI to neurodegenerative disease; Graph theoretic analysis of rs-fMRI; and more!

A rapidly growing body of research has consituted a new discipline that may be called cognitive neuroscience of aging. This book offers an introduction to the topic, useful to both professionals & students in cognitive neuroscience, cognitive psychology, neuroscience, neuropsychology & neurology.

The creation and processing of visual representations in the life sciences is a critical but often overlooked aspect of scientific pedagogy. The Educated Eye follows the nineteenth-century embrace of the visible in new spectatoria, or demonstration halls, through the twentieth-century cinematic explorations of microscopic realms and simulations of surgery in virtual reality. With essays on Doc Edgerton's stroboscopic techniques that froze time and Eames's visualization of scale in Powers of Ten, among others, contributors ask how we are taught to see the unseen.

This issue of Medical Clinics covers the important advances surrounding the early intervention of Alzheimer's Disease. Guest edited by world-renowned experts from around the world, the topics covered will include evaluation of new diagnostic criteria, CSF biomarkers, diagnostic imaging, neurocognitive approaches, breaking clinical trials and more.

A familiar trope of cognitive science, linguistics, and the philosophy of psychology over the past forty or so years has been the idea of the mind as a modular system-that is, one consisting of functionally specialized subsystems responsible for processing different classes of input, or handling specific cognitive tasks like vision, language, logic, music, and so on. However, one of the major achievements of neuroscience has been the discovery that the brain has incredible powers of renewal and reorganization. This "neuroplasticity," in its various forms, has challenged many of the orthodox conceptions of the mind which originally led cognitive scientists to postulate hardwired mental modules. This book examines how such discoveries have changed the way we think about the structure of the mind. It contends that the mind is more supple than prevailing theories in cognitive science and artificial intelligence acknowledge. The book uses language as a test case. The claim that language is cognitively special has often been understood as the claim that it is underpinned by dedicated-and innate-cognitive mechanisms. Zerilli offers a fresh take on how our linguistic abilities could be domain-general: enabled by a composite of very small and redundant cognitive subsystems, few if any of which are likely to be specialized for language. In arguing for this position, however, the book takes seriously various cases suggesting that language dissociates from other cognitive faculties. Accessibly written, The Adaptable Mind is a fascinating account of neuroplasticity, neural reuse, the modularity of mind, the evolution of language, and faculty psychology.

The field of strategic management has developed significantly since its birth from "business policy" and "business planning" in the 1960s. Pioneering studies were essentially normative, prescriptive, and often based on in-depth case studies. The evolution of strategic management into a respected field of academic study resulted from the adoption of research methods previously employed in economics. Today, research in strategic management is likely to employ a mixture of methods borrowed from related and unrelated disciplines, such as politcal sciences, psychology, neuroscience, and behavioral economics, which can be confusing to researchers new to the field. This book provides the reader with a broad introduction to the array of qualitative and quantitative research methods required to investigate strategic management. Throughout the book, strong emphasis is placed on practical applications that transcend the mere analysis of the theoretical roots of single research methods. The underlying result is a book that encourages and aids readers to "learn by doing" – in applying the implications of each chapter to their own research. This text is vital reading for postgraduate students and researchers focused on business strategy.

As the aging population degree is deepened, cognitive impairment has become a globally recognized public health problem. As an intermediate state from normal cognition (NC) to Alzheimer's disease (AD), mild cognitive impairment (MCI) has a highly variable cognitive trajectory, which contains three outcomes: 1) progression to AD and other types of dementia; 2) Maintaining stability; 3) Reversal to NC. Reversal of cognitive function can be achieved by taking positive and effective measures. Current studies mostly focus on factors affecting MCI to AD. World Health Organization and Alzheimer’s Disease International have also proposed relatively mature guidelines for risk factors. However, there are still some influencing factors that have not yet formed a unified conclusion. In addition, there are fewer studies and no consensus on the influencing factors for MCI to NC. Current forms of intervention for MCI are mainly non-pharmacological interventions, and there is a lack of randomized controlled trials with larger sample sizes and longer intervention periods to confirm the effect of pharmacological and non-pharmacological interventions. The purpose of this study is to explore the factors that influence the transition from MCI to AD or NC in aging adults, and to examine how the influencing factors make the cognitive function of aging adults with MCI deteriorate, improve or even reverse to NC and how are their reversal rates. This includes effective measures proven through pharmacological and non-pharmacological intervention studies and their impact on reversal. Influence factors include but are not limited to demographic factors (age, socioeconomic status, education), lifestyle (smoking, alcohol consumption, physical activity, nutrition, social participation), mental health (depression, loneliness), diseases (hypertension, diabetes, sleep disorders), biological markers (ß-amyloid, tau protein), and pharmacological factors (cholinesterase inhibitor, Aß monoclonal antibodies, drugs to rebalance the gut flora), etc., and submission of research results based on intervention trials is encouraged.

The extraordinary story of how the human brain evolved… and is still evolving. We’ve come a long way. The earliest human had a brain as small as a child’s fist; ours are four times bigger, with spectacular abilities and potential we are only just beginning to understand. This is How the Mind Changed, a seven-million-year journey through our own heads, packed with vivid stories, groundbreaking science, and thrilling surprises. Discover how memory has almost nothing to do with the past; meditation rewires our synapses; magic mushroom use might be responsible for our intelligence; climate accounts for linguistic diversity; and how autism teaches us hugely positive lessons about our past and future. Dr. Joseph Jebelli’s In Pursuit of Memory was shortlisted for the Royal Society Science Book Prize and longlisted for the Wellcome. In this, his eagerly awaited second book, he draws on deep insights from neuroscience, evolutionary biology, psychology, and philosophy to guide us through the unexpected changes that shaped our brains. From genetic accidents and environmental forces to historical and cultural advances, he explores how our brain’s evolution turned us into Homo sapiens and beyond. A single mutation is all it takes.

In this volume of the series Human Brain Function: Assessment and Rehabilitation we cover the area of how brain function is assessed with behavioral or neuropsycholog ical instruments. These assessments are typically conducted by clinical neuropsy chologists or behavioral neurologists, and so we made an effort to present the somewhat differing approaches to these two related disciplines. Clinical neuropsy chologists are psychologists who typically utilize standardized tests, while behav ioral neurologists are physicians who generally assess brain function as part of the clinical neurological evaluation. Both approaches have much to offer. The basic assumption of neuropsychological assessment is that the brain is the organ of behavior, and therefore, the condition of the brain may be evaluated with behavioral measures. Neuropsychological tests are those measures found by re search to be particularly sensitive to alterations in brain function. An adequate neuropsychological test is a procedure that can be related to some objective mea sure of alteration in brain function. Over the years, these objective measures have changed, but generally involve documentation through direct observation of brain tissue, or through histological, pathological, neuroimaging, or other laboratory procedures. The methods described in the first two volumes of this series describe the neuroimaging procedures that are often used in the validation of neuropsycho logical tests.