 The brain. We still know so little about how it works, but we do have a pretty good understanding of its anatomy And its anatomy is actually quite simple which may come as a surprise to you If you've just spent several hours in a lecture theater looking at 2D slides and being bombarded by Latin terminology But it is simple, and I hope to prove that to you. So let's begin We'll be using this simplified geometric model And the first thing we see on the outside of the brain is the cortex In Latin this means bark like the bark of a tree Because it is the rough outer surface of the brain The cortex is all gray matter Briefly, what is gray matter? So the brain and the nervous system at large is made up of billions of neurons and neurons have cell bodies and axons A simple way to think of it is that cell bodies either generate or receive messages while axons transmit messages When cell bodies clump together they look gray Thus gray matter So the cortex is all cell bodies of neurons And we divide the cortex into lobes. We have the frontal lobes the parietal lobes the occipital lobes And temporal lobes If we cut the frontal lobe now we can see the gray matter only goes for a centimeter or so And beneath it is white matter axons clumped together Axons are surrounded by this fatty substance called myelin which makes them look white And one of the main pathways for white matter in the brain Is the internal capsule here Many of the axons running through here are on their way to the thalamus an important chunk of gray matter in the middle of the brain Thalamus means inner chamber or bedroom in ancient greek The inner chamber of your mind Beneath the thalamus is the logically named hypothalamus Hypo meaning under or below or beneath it's tiny But hugely important with involvement in a huge range of fundamental bodily processes Hanging off the hypothalamus is the pituitary gland Moving above the thalamus now we see this arch of white matter Connecting either side of the brain This is called the corpus callosum Beneath it is another arch which wraps more tightly around the thalamus called the phornix Phornix is literally latin for arch Riding alongside the phornix is the hippocampus named after a mythological seahorse It's one part of what we call the basal ganglia There are a few structures in the basal ganglia all situated roughly around this area Directly under the thalamus is the brain stem which connects the brain to the spinal cord It has three parts the midbrain pons and medulla The cerebellum which means little brain sits just behind the pons and under the occipital lobe Above that sitting in between the thalamus on either side is the pineal gland As you may know the brain floats in a clear liquid called cerebrospinal fluid This also circulates through chambers sitting between different parts of the brain which are known as ventricles We have the lateral ventricles here aka ventricle 1 and 2 Then this one between either side of the thalamus is called the third ventricle This one between the pons and the cerebellum is the fourth ventricle They're all connected by little channels into the space surrounding the spinal cord as well Click the link below to have a look around this model yourself Click the like button if you enjoyed this video. Thank you very much for watching and we'll see you next time