Neuroscience is a collective term for all scientific disciplines that deal with the structure and function of the nervous system and the brain. At a basic level, neuroscience is the study of nervous systems. There are many branches of neuroscience and various applications, ranging from diagnosing and treating diseases to increasing our understanding of consciousness. Neuroscience even has applications in the field of artificial intelligence (AI).

Neuroscience is the study of the nervous system, the complex network of cells that transmits information throughout the body. Humans and other animals all have nervous systems of varying complexity. Even jellyfish have nervous systems in the form of interconnected neurons called nerve nets, although they do not have true brains. Vertebrates, such as humans, have complex nervous systems built around a brain and spinal cord and a peripheral nervous system that gathers information from the various senses and sends commands to muscles throughout the body.

Although neuroscience is largely concerned with the study of biological systems, it is a multidisciplinary field that encompasses aspects of biology, chemistry, physics, and mathematics. Some of the goals of neuroscience are to study and understand the structure and function of the nervous system, the development of the nervous system, and the connections between the nervous system and behavior.

Since neuroscience is the study of the nervous system, it would seem that neuroscience should be a branch of biology. The reality is that neuroscience extends into many more disciplines than that, with several separate branches. The branch that specifically deals with the biology of the nervous system is neurobiology, but that is just one example.