Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 1
. Anatomy. (
A
) Three-dimensional drawing of a folium of the cerebellar cortex. Re-
printed with permission from S. Harrison (
BNI Quarterly
, Journal of St. Jospeph's Hospital,
Barrow Neurological Institue, Phoenix, AZ,
2
(2), 1986). (
B
) Schematics of the microarchitec-
ture of the cerebellar cortex and nuclei with different elements, including the synaptic connec-
tion with "+" for excitatory and "-" for inhibitory synaptic transmission.
The cerebellar cortex is a uniform structure. It is divided into three distinct
layers: the molecular layer, the Purkinje cell layer, and the granular layer (Figure
1). The cerebellar cortex contains five types of neurons: (1) Purkinje, (2) gran-
ule, (3) Golgi, (4) stellate, and (5) basket cell. The molecular layer is the outer-
most layer and contains primarily the ascending part of the axons of the granule
cells, which bifurcate rectangularly, sending fibers along the direction of the
folium, and are thus termed parallel fibers. Moreover, there are also dendrites of
the Purkinje and Golgi cells, climbing fibers, and two types of interneurons
