Cerebellum

The cerebellum is a major feature of the hindbrain of all vertebrates. It plays an important role in motor control and may also be involved in some cognitive functions such as attention and language. It contains more neurons than the total of the brain, but takes up only 10% of the total brain volume.

About Cerebellum in brief

Summary CerebellumThe cerebellum is a major feature of the hindbrain of all vertebrates. It is usually smaller than the cerebrum, but in some animals such as the mormyrid fishes it may be as large as or even larger. It plays an important role in motor control and may also be involved in some cognitive functions such as attention and language. Cerebellar damage produces disorders in fine movement, equilibrium, posture, and motor learning in humans. It contains more neurons than the total of the brain, but takes up only 10% of the total brain volume. There are about 6 times as many neurons in the Cerebellum as in the neocortex, a ratio that is that is across many different mammalian species. Each ridge or gyrus in this layer is called a folium. Each cerebellar cortex is estimated that if it were completely unfolded, it would give rise to a neural tissue that is about 1.5 times as conserved as in neocortex. The surface appearance of the cerebellums conceals the fact that most of its volume is made up of a very tightly folded layer of gray matter. The most important being Purkinje cells and granule cells, which are involved in the movement-related functions of the human brain. It does not initiate movement, but contributes to coordination, precision, and accurate timing. It receives input from sensory systems of the spinal cord and from other parts of brain, and integrates these inputs to fine-tune motor activity.

In addition to motor control, the cere Bellum is necessary for several types of motor learning, most notably learning to adjust to changes in sensorimotor relationships. The Marr–Albus theory is that the climbing fiber serves as a ‘teaching signal’ which induces a long-lasting change in the strength of parallel fiber inputs. This theory is controversial, but it has provided some support for theories of this type, but their validity remains controversial. Like the cerebral cortex, it is divided into two cerebellare hemispheres. It also contains a narrow midline zone. A set of large folds is, by convention, used to divide the overall structure into 10 smaller ‘lobules’ The cerebellas are located in the posterior cranial fossa, in the middle of the rhombencephalon or ‘hindbrain’ It is separated from the overlying cerebrums by a layer of leathery dura mater, the tentorium cerebelli. All of its connections with other part of thebrain travel through the pons. An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that the brain’s ‘cerebellum’ was the ‘metencephalons’. We are happy to clarify that this is not the case, and that the “hind Brain’ is the part that is responsible for most of the communication between the brain and the rest of the body. We apologise for the error.