What's with the brain controlling head,arm,leg in an upside down way?

[scilearner]

Hello everyone,

 

Ok in the cerebralcortex I saw a pic where there is upside down HAL, the brain controls head,arm, leg upside down. Now I don't know much about this area. I know there is only motor cortex, so are these areas referring to axons that are coming out of motor cortex and supplying these correspondinga areas. Thanks

[shaft21]

the cortex is grey matter , which has only cytons or cell bodies of neurons , there r no axons in the grey matter or the cerebral cortex.

Edited February 20, 2011 by shaft21

[scilearner]

the cortex is grey matter , which has only cytons or cell bodies of neurons , there r no axons in the grey matter or the cerebral cortex.

 

But motor cortex is a small area. Ok if we take a coronal section from motor area, is it legs,arm, head. Is that what is happening?

[SMF]

Scilearner, I don't understand your question. The orientation of somatotopic representations are arbitrary. They just have to be internally consistent.

 

Shaft21, there are plenty of axons in the gray matter region of cerebral cortex. The axons of the neuron cell bodies there either travel locally, within the gray matter to make local connections, or exit into the white matter of cortex for traveling over longer distances. There are, however, no neuron cell bodies in the white matter.

 

SM