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Memory and Ageing Center - Memory glossary Category: Health and Medicine > Memory and Ageing Date & country: 27/09/2013, USA Words: 62

agnosia
A loss of the ability to recognize objects, persons, sounds, shapes or smells without injury to the primary sensory organ or memory loss

agrammatism
The presence of grammatical errors in speech, such as the omission or incorrect usage of articles (

akinetic mutism
A state where a person can no longer move or talk due to damage to the base of the brain, but the person is awake (not comatose) and their eyes are open and can follow what is going on around them.

amyloid
A clump of insoluble, fibrous protein that can accumulate in brain tissue because of a variety of different diseases. These deposits disrupt cell function and can lead to premature cell death. The aggregated protein will vary with the particular disease.

aphasia
A loss of the ability to produce and/or understand language due to injury to brain areas specialized for these functions.

apraxia
The loss of the ability to perform tasks that require remembering patterns or sequences of movements (like waving goodbye).

associative agnosia
A failure to assign meaning to an object, animal or building that is clearly perceived. For example, a patient with an associative visual agnosis might be able to draw a cow, but would not know what a cow was or did.

ataxia
Shaky movements, wobbliness, unsteady walk and clumsiness usually caused by damage to the cerebellum, a part of the brain which controls movement

atrophy
Wasting away or shrinking. Neuronal atrophy is wasting away of neurons, a decrease in neuronal density.

cellular inclusion
Any small entity found within a cell.

central nervous system
A general term used to describe the brain and spinal cord

cerebellar ataxia
Shaky movements, wobbliness, unsteady walk and clumsiness usually caused by damage to the cerebellum, a part of the brain which controls movement

cerebellar signs
Pertaining to the cerebellum, the part of the brain in the back of the head between the cerebrum and the brain stem; the cerebellum controls balance for walking and standing and other complex motor functions

cerebrospinal fluid (CSF)
A clear, watery liquid that bathes, cushions and protects the brain and spinal cord

cerebrum
The largest part of the brain; it is responsible for learning and other conscious mental functions

chorea
Irregular, spasmodic, involuntary movements of the limbs or facial muscles, often accompanied by hypotonia (decreased tone of skeletal muscles)

chromosome
Strands of DNA compressed and organized into a double helix structure. Humans typically have 23 pairs of chromosomes.

chromosome 17q21 (FTDP-17)
The chromosome that contains the gene for making the protein tau.

codon 129
The human prion protein (PrP) has a common polymorphism at codon 129 of the gene PRNP; this polymorphism has a strong influence on genetic susceptibility to prion diseases

cortex
The outer portion of an organ. In the brain, the outer portion of the cerebrum is the cerebral cortex.

CT (computerized tomography)
Pictures of structures within the body created by a computer that takes the data from multiple X-ray images and turns them in pictures. Using the same dosage of radiation as that of an ordinary X-ray machine, an entire slice of the body can be made visible with about 100 times more clarity with the CT scan.

dementia
A deterioration of intellectual faculties, such as memory, concentration and judgment, resulting from an organic disease or disorder of the brain. It is sometimes accompanied by emotional disturbance and personality changes.

dysesthesia
Painful sensory symptoms, distortion/impairment of any sense (especially the sense of touch), a condition in which an unpleasant sensation is produced by ordinary stimuli

dysphagia
Difficulty in swallowing due to problems in nerve or muscle control

dystonia
Involuntary, sustained muscle contractions that frequently cause twisting body motions, tremor, and abnormal posture (these movements may involve the entire body, or only an isolated area)

electroencephalogram (EEG)
An EEG is a recording of the electrical activity of your brain. Flat metal discs (electrodes) placed on your scalp detect and record the patterns of electrical activity generated by your brain.

encephalopathy
Any disease in which the functioning of the brain is affected

episodic memory
The memory of events, times, places, associated emotions and other conception-based knowledge in relation to an experience.

extrapyramidal signs
The extrapyramidal system regulates subconscious control of erratic motions, muscle tone and truncal stability through the basal ganglia; injuries to this system can cause movement disorders, inability to initiate movement and/or inability to remain motionless

frontal lobe
The part of each hemisphere of the brain located behind the forehead that serves to regulate and mediate the higher intellectual functions. The frontal lobes have intricate connections to other areas of the brain. In the frontal lobes, we meld emotions, cognition, error detection, volition, a sense of self, and more to create our social brain.

frontotemporal dementia (FTD)
The umbrella term for the clinical syndromes of behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD), semantic dementia (SD) and progressive non-fluent aphasia (PNFA). These syndromes share involvement of the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain. This term is sometimes used to refer specifically to bvFTD.

gait
How a person walks

gene
A specific subunit of DNA that codes for a specific protein.

gliosis
A process leading to scars in the central nervous system that involves the production of a dense fibrous network of neuroglia (supporting cells) in areas of damage. Gliosis is a prominent feature of many diseases of the central nervous system, including frontotemporal dementia, Alzheimer's disease, multiple sclerosis and stroke. After a stroke, neurons die and disappear with replacement gliosis.

gray matter
The cortex of the brain which contains nerve cell bodies. The gray matter is in contrast to the white matter, the part of the brain that contains myelinated nerve fibers. The gray matter is so named because it appears gray.

hyperreflexia
An abnormal, increased action of the reflexes; a reaction of the autonomic (involuntary) nervous system to over-stimulation

iatrogenic
Disease acquired as the result of accidental transmission from one patient to another by medical or surgical procedures

microtubules
A key structural element of the scaffolding structure of a cell or cytoskeleton.

MRI (magnetic resonance imaging)
A radiology technique that uses magnetism, radio waves and a computer to produce non-invasive, high quality images of internal structures of the body. An MRI is painless, does not use x-ray radiation and is a powerful tool for delineating brain structure.

myoclonus
Sudden, involuntary jerking or twitching of a muscle or group of muscles

neurofibrillary tangle
Pathological clusters of the protein tau that are found within neurons.

neuronal inclusion
Any small intracellular body found within a neuron (nerve or brain cell).

pathology
The study and diagnosis of disease through examination of organs, tissues, bodily fluids or whole bodies.

PCR (polymerase chain reaction)
A key technique in molecular genetics to rapidly copy a short section of DNA or RNA for analysis without having to clone it.

pedigree
In medicine, a family health history diagrammed with a set of international symbols to indicate the individuals in the family, their relationships to one another, those with a disease, etc.

phonemic paraphasias
Errors involving use of the incorrect phoneme (

Pick bodies
A specific type of cellular inclusion made up of the protein tau and seen in some people with FTD.

Pick's disease
Another name for behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD), also called frontotemporal dementia (FTD)

presenile degenerative dementia
Dementia that starts in people before 65 years of age.

presenting symptom
The first change noticed by the patient or caregiver; the change that brings them into the doctor's office.

prion
A infectious agent made up of abnormally folded protein and no genetic material. A disease-causing agent that is neither bacterial nor fungal nor viral and contains no genetic material. The prion protein occurs normally in a harmless form. By folding into an aberrant shape, the normal prion protein turns into a rogue agent. It then co-opts other normal prions to become rogue prions.

prodromal symptoms
Any symptom affecting a system other than the nervous system preceding the first neurologic symptom or sign.

pulvinar sign
Symmetrically increased signal intensity in the pulvinar region (posterior part of the thalamus) relative to the signal intensity in other deep and cortical gray matter areas on an MRI; the presence of this MRI feature may suggest a vCJD diagnosis in the appropriate clinical context

pyramidal signs
The pyramidal system controls all of our voluntary movements; it is made up of two systems

rapidly progressive dementia
A form of dementia in which the time course from first symptom to dementia is less than two years and often less than one year

semantic memory
The memory of meanings, understandings and other concept-based knowledge. Remembering that a robin is a bird with a red breast is one example of semantic knowledge.

sign
A sign is an indication that something is not right in the body; defined as things that can be seen by a doctor, nurse or other health care professional; fever, rapid breathing rate and abnormal breathing sounds heard through a stethoscope may be signs of pneumonia

symptom
An indication of disease, illness, injury or that something is not right in the body; symptoms are felt or noticed by a person, but may not easily be noticed by anyone else; chills, weakness, shortness of breath, and a cough may be symptoms of pneumonia

tau
A protein in the body that aids in the cellular structure (cytoskeleton) and cellular transportation.

temporal lobe
The lobe of the cerebral hemisphere located down on the side of the brain near the ears. The temporal lobe contains the auditory cortex which is responsible for hearing, language comprehension and memory.

vacuolation
A neuropathologic term that replaces the older terminology of

white matter
The part of the brain that contains myelinated nerve fibers. The white matter is white because it is the color of myelin, the insulation covering the nerve fibers. The white matter is as opposed to the gray matter (the cortex of the brain which contains nerve cell bodies).