 Hey everybody, Dr. O here. In this video, we're just going to cover the basic structure of a typical neuron. So here we see, whenever you see a drawing or an image of a typical neuron, it's usually a multipolar neuron like this. We'll cover the different types of neuron structures in probably the next video. But a typical neuron is going to be made of three primary structures. You have the cell body, also known as the soma. You're going to have dendrites. There can be several. There can even be a hundred or more dendrites. And then you're going to have that single axon going down to the synapse. So let's talk about each of these things just for a moment. So the cell body is going to be where all the cell organelles and these types of things are going to be. The genetic information for the cells is going to be there. It's going to help keep and maintain the structure of this neuron. And it's also where the energy is produced that's going to drive all these other activities that are occurring at a neuron. So that's the primary function of a cell body. Now one organelle you won't see in a cell body that you'll see in most cells or many cells is you won't see centrioles, at least in most neurons. There are some that are believed to be able to divide. But neurons don't have centrioles typically, which means they can't divide. When a neuron dies, then it's either gone or needs to be replaced by some sort of a stem cell. All right. Then we have the dendrites. There's going to be many of them. Like I said, at least several of them. And then each of these dendrites are going to have these many little fine hair like structures called dendritic spines on them, which give them a massive surface area. This 80 to 90 percent of the surface area of a neuron is going to be these little tiny dendritic spines. That means that this single neuron can receive information from hundreds or thousands of places, maybe up to 100,000 different places, can be sending information to this neuron. That's why dendrites are important. Dendrites are the afferent part of a neuron. They receive the information that travels to the cell body. Then when the cell body needs to act, the efferent part of this neuron will be the single axon. So again, there can be dozens of dendrites with all those little dendric spines, but there's only going to be this one axon typically. So an axon is going to be what carries the electrical signal from this neuron's cell body to wherever its target is. So if a neuron decides to act, whatever its function is, if it decides to act, it's going to fire a signal down this axon. And we'll cover the illigodendrocytes and myelin later. But this axon is carrying this information down to the end. At the end of that axon, you see how branches, excuse me, the branches off a single axon are called collaterals. And then at the tail end, I got a better picture here. You have what are called teledendria as they branch even more. And then you have the synapse. So the synapse is going to be the most critical area where one neuron communicates with either another neuron or a muscle or whatever it's going to be controlling. So the synapse is going to be how the electrical signal from this neuron is turned into a chemical signal that can then cause a muscle contract, a gland to do something, et cetera, et cetera. Okay, so you have the cell body, the single axon that carries information away from the cell body, the dendrites that carry information towards the cell body, and the synapse is the site of this chemical communication. All right, that's the basics of a neuron. I hope this helps. Have a wonderful day, be blessed.