A measure of a body’s or system’s ability or capacity to do work, and like work itself it is measured in joules. There are various forms of energy that can be converted one into the other by suitable means: chemical, electrical, heat, kinetic, nuclear, potential and nuclear energy. Conversion of these forms can only occur …
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Endorphins
A group of neuropeptide hormones (or neurotransmitters), found mainly in the brain, that bind to opiate receptors, and which have analgesic properties similar to morphine. Twenty different types of endorphins have been identified, but the three major ones are beta endorphins (composed of 31 amino acids) located chiefly in the pituitary gland, and enkephalins and …
Endochondral ossification
Bone matrix formed from (hyaline) cartilage template, and which is the process responsible for most of bone growth in vertebrate skeletons (see figure below). The first site of ossification occurs in the diaphysis or shaft. The process of endrochondal bone growth. Also called cartilage cells, chondrocytes are polymorphic connective tissue cells that produce and maintain …
Endoplasmic reticulum (ER)
A bag-like membrane system of channels, flattened sacs and tubes within eukaryotic cells that stores and transports proteins within cells to the Golgi apparatus, as well as the various enzymes required for the synthesis of fats. Proteins that are to become part of a cell membrane are translated and folded in the ER before being …
Endemic cretinism
A clinical syndrome of intellectual disability, spastic-rigid motor disorder and deaf-mutism strongly associated with low maternal thyroid hormone levels during pregnancy and with severe periconceptional iodine deficiency. See Cerebral palsy, Iodine, Iodine deficiency
Encoding specificity
Endel Tulving‘s hypothesis that memory retrieval or recall is improved when information present at encoding, including contextual details, are also available at the time of retrieval. For example, memorizing the word ‚’tree’ in the context of ‘apple tree’ will lead to a deterioration in the ability to recognize it when presented in another context such …
Enculturation
The process of socialization by which children come to internalize the values, practices and knowledge judged to be central by their own (sub-) culture or group. Enculturation, actually a life-long process, occurs both with and without direct teaching or instruction. Also referred to as acculturation, a term introduced by the anthropologist John Wesley Powell (1834-1902) …
Encoding
The operation of coding or transforming the input of events or stimuli into a representation that can be stored in memory so that it can be retrieved. Decoding then is the unscrambling of an input that is already coded. The term has wide application, being also used, for example, in terms of encoding emotional expressions …
Encephalitis
Acute inflammation of the brain (a reaction of the immune system), typically due to viral infection sometimes transmitted by mosquitoes or arising as a consequence of lead poisoning, but assuming a number of different types. When it involves the spinal cord as well, it is referred to encephalomyelitis. It can also occur as a complication …
Emulation
Duplicating the outcomes produced by another, but using different actions to reach this same end (i.e., goal emulation). Sometimes referred to affordance learning. It appears that the great apes are capable of emulation, but not action-level imitation. See Affordance, Correspondence problem, Imitation, Newborn imitation, Observational learning