I am a neuron. I was born from precursor cells or stem cells. These stem cells make every cell in a human when they are still in their mother’s womb, and they make most of the cells after the human is born.

As a neuron, I have the same cellular structure as other cells in your body, with a few exceptions. But like other cells, I have a nucleus that holds DNA and mitochondrion to make energy for me. I also have golgi body and microtubules.

When a human is still in its mother’s womb, it starts out as a hollow ball, but parts of that ball fold in and create a hollow tube, which is where neurons will be. This is also where the brain will be. Just 23 days after humans are conceived, this neural tube is finished forming, and it closes to form the brain. The next day, the forebrain or frontal brain begins to develop as well as the heart!

Once a neuron, like me, is born, we have to migrate to the place where we are going to live for the rest of our lives. This is also the place where we will work and make connections. So how do I know where I need to go? And how do I get there? A lot of neurons slide along these long fibers that they follow called radial glia. The radial glia comes from where the brain will eventually develop in the neural tube.

Another way that we find our way home is by our neighbors. There are special chemicals that we have and that we can sense on other neurons. These chemicals tell us who we’re by and where we are by binding with glial cells or with axons of other nerves. However, migrating is dangerous for a neuron: only some of us make it to where we’re supposed to be. About 1/3 of us get to our home in the human brain.

Once I get to my home, I have to settle in, unpack, and get to work. This is when I know what kind of neuron I am, whether I am a sensory neuron, a motor neuron, or an interneuron. This is determined by what kind of neurons my neighbors are. If they are all motor neurons, then I want to be a motor neuron too.

I will begin to form friendships or connections with my neighbors, and our connection will grow stronger the more we interact with each other. This connection will help keep me alive; if neurons do not make connections with their neighbors then they will eventually die!

Now, I am a neuron in the motor cortex of the brain, so I am a motor neuron. I help control how a person’s body moves by sending information through my axons to other places that tell the muscles to move.

I am a motor neuron in a human named Leonard. Leonard is a good baby. He does not cry too much, and he is fascinated by everything. His mother reads to him and helps his brain make connections that he will use later in life.

I was one of Leonard’s last motor neurons, one of the few who saw Leonard through the whole ordeal and then went through it again. Unfortunately, all of my neighbors had gone, and my connections grew weaker and weaker until the Lewy bodies overcame me and finally died.

Neurobiological Concepts

• Stem cells
• Neuronal cellular structure
• Embryonic development
• Neuron migration
• Chemical signaling
• Types of neurons
• Forming connections
• Motor cortex neurons
• Dopamine
• Direct and indirect pathways
• Parkinson’s symptoms
• Alpha-synuclein
• Lewy bodies
• Aggregation
• L-dopa
• Cell death

 

News Contact

This author wrote the paper for Biology 130:  Deadly Shape Hostage Brain taught by Dr. Shubhik DebBurman.