Neurons, networks, and behavior


How does light energy falling on the back of our eye get interpreted as a particular image of our friend or a painting or a leaf? How does a cockroach escape imminent predation by a toad? How does a slug remember that a recent poke wasnÕt dangerous? How do we remember? A rigorous consideration of general principles of neural integration at the cellular, sensory, central, and motor levels of organization will serve as the groundwork for an examination of such questions of integration. Then we will apply those principles to particular systems including: locust flight, cockroach escape,the role of giant fibers in crayfish behavior, memory and learning in invertebrates and vertebrates, and vertebrate visual systems (from light transduction in the retina through integration in the visual cortex). Students will read appropriate primary literature (both classical and contemporary) and conduct their own research projects.

Syllabus Spring 2017: Tues. and Friday, 8:20 a.m.-10:00 a.m. ; Dickinson 117
(note the time; I will make meetings with you for labs)

Online Neuro textbooks

Neuroscience (Purves et al)
        Voltage clamp
        Patch clamp

Neuroscience (University of Texas Medical School)

The Nervous system in action (University of Nebraska Medical University)

This may be review for some of you but we will begin with this:

Diffusion potential (Eion )
Basis of resting membrane potential (Em(rest)  )
Active and passive membrane responses
Ionic basis of action potential
Synaptic function (difference between currents and potentials)-neuromuscular junction (synapse) as example
Iion =gion |Em-Eion |

Interesting  links for history of the study of neuroscience: https://www.sfn.org/about/history-of-neuroscience; https://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/hist.html

Illustrative systems we will study include:

Evolution of the nervous system:  Cnidarians and the evolutionary origin of the nervous system (2009)

Neuronal modeling primer (from Camhi)

1) cockroach escape
   a) The Escape Behavior of the Cockroach Periplaneta americana I. Turning Response to Wind Puffs (1978)
   b)The Escape Behavior of the Cockroach Periplaneta americana II. Detection of Natural Predators by Air Displacement (1978)
   c) Responses of Giant Interneurons of the Cockroach Periplaneta americana to Wind Puffs of Different Directions and Velocities (1977)
   d) Effect of Static Load on Motor Behavior of the Cockroach Periplaneta americana (2008)
   e) Cockroaches Keep Predators Guessing by Using Preferred Escape Trajectories (2008)
   f) Wasp uses venom cocktail to manipulate the behavior of its cockroach prey (2003)
        Video1
        Video2-a more detailed explanation if you ignore the rampant anthropomorphizing
   g) A Wasp Manipulates Neuronal Activity in the Sub-Esophageal Ganglion to Decrease the Drive for Walking in Its Cockroach Prey (2010)
   h) Sensory Arsenal on the Stinger of the Parasitoid Jewel Wasp and Its Possible Role in Identifying Cockroach Brains (2014)

   i)Wasp Voodoo Rituals, Venom-Cocktails, and the Zombification of Cockroach Hosts (2014)
   j) Do Quiescence and Wasp Venom-Induced Lethargy Share Common Neuronal Mechanisms in Cockroaches?(2017)

2) locust flight
    a) D. M. Wilson (1961)-classic paper-locust flight motor
            draw a putative network diagram of the locust flight motor using the data from Wilson
        locust flight handouts
        Video-simulation of locust flight-think about what the different colors mean
    b) Central control of locust flight (2006) sets Wilson's work in historical context
    c) A muscarinic cholinergic mechanism underlies activation of the central pattern generator for locust flight (2008)
            It will help you to make a table of the different putative neurotransmitters, agonists, and antagonists
            From Purves et al

3) crayfish command fibers
     a) Release of coordinated behavior in crayfish by single neurons (1966)-classic paper  
     b) Coordination of Rhythmic Motor Activity by Gradients of Synaptic Strength in a Neural Circuit That Couples Modular Neural Oscillators (2009)

Review of motor commands: Fifty years of CPGs: two neuroethological papers that shaped the course of neuroscience (2010)

4) memory and learning in molluscs-
    Nova video-learning and memory in Aplysia
    Sensitization in Aplysia-slide show from Neurosciences
    Aplysia handout

    a) The Molecular Biology of Memory Storage: A Dialogue Between Genes and Synapses 2001
                LINK to PURVES et al

    b) Learning in Aplysia: looking at synaptic plasticity from both sides 2003
    c) Activity-Dependent Presynaptic Facilitation and Hebbian LTP Are Both Required and Interact during Classical Conditioning in Aplysia 2003
    d) The Biology of Memory: A Forty-Year Perspective - Kandel 2009
    e) Habituation in Aplysia 2009
    f) Small systems of neurons-Kandel early review 1979
    g) Long-term facilitation in Aplysia (1988)
    h) Learning and individuality Kandel and Hawkins (1992)
    i)
The Octopus: A Model for a Comparative Analysis of the Evolution of Learning and Memory Mechanisms (2006)
    j) The Octopus Vertical Lobe Modulates Short-Term Learning Rate and Uses LTP to Acquire Long-Term Memory (2008)

5) memory and learning in mammals LINK to PURVES et al
LTP animation

    a) Differing presynaptic contributions to LTP and associative learning in behaving mice 2009
    b) Structural plasticity and memory 2004
    c) Effects of enriched physical and social environments on motor performance, associative learning, and hippocampal neurogenesis in mice 2010
    d) Synaptic plasticity and addiction 2007
    e) Transition to addiction is associated with a persistent impairment in synaptic plasticity 2010
            supporting material
    f) Postmortem examination of patient H.M.'s brain (2014)
   g) Requirement of hippocampal neurogenesis for the behavioral effects of antidepressants (2003)

6) visual systems Purves chapters 11, 12

     a) Strange vision: ganglion cells as circadian photoreceptors  (2003)
     
b) Frequency-dependent reduction of voltage-gated sodium current modulates retinal ganglion cell response (2011)

    c) Image-matching during ant navigation (2011)
    d) Desert ant navigation: how miniature brains solve complex tasks (2003)

    e)Active flight increases the gain of visual motion processing in Drosophila

    f) Patterning and Plasticity of the Cerebral Cortex (2005)-extraordinary study in which visual input is diverted to auditory cortex in neonatal ferrets


7) Higher integrative CNS processes

    a)Dysfunction in the Neural Circuitry of Emotion RegulationÑA Possible Prelude to Violence

pnas201320    b) Orexin/hypocretin system modulates amygdala- dependent threat learning through the locus coeruleus (2013)   
  c)    Neural correlates of admiration and compassion
   d) The role of primordial emotions in the evolutionary origin of consciousness

e)Social Cognition and the Evolution of Language: Constructing Cognitive Phylogenies (2010)

    f)A preliminary analysis of sleep-like states in the cuttlefish (2012)

 g)   Syntactic processing in the human brain: What we know, what we donÕt know, and a suggestion for how to proceed 2011

    h)Functional specificity in the human brain: A window into the functional architecture of the   
  i)  Separate Processing of Texture and Form in the Ventral Stream: Evidence from fMRI and
   j)  Visual  Agnosia2010

   k) A critical review of the development of face recognition: Experience is less important than previously believed 2012

  l)  Perception of Face Parts and Face Configurations: An fMRI Study 2009

  m) Obesity elicits interleukin 1-mediated deficits in hippocampal synaptic plasticity (2014) 

 n) Dopamine imbalance in huntington's disease: a mechanism for the lack of behavioral flexibility (2013)

 


The neurology of consciousness: cognitive neuroscience and neuropathology  By Steven Laureys, Giulio Tononi  GOOGLE BOOKS

Course Requirements: see how to read and facilitate (download this!)
    1-attend all classes and be well-prepared
    2-read assignments AND take notes  CHECK OUT THIS PAPER: The Pen Is Mightier Than the Keyboard:Advantages of Longhand Over Laptop Note Taking
                                                                               AND THIS ONE: Learning to learn

    3-browse current journals
    4-in class discussion (facilitate and participate and choose papers) This is a discussion class.  Talk to each other during class.
    5-research project

         By midterm:
                -things to consider during proposal presentation for Oct. 17
                -research proposal with literature cited -due:  Oct. Oct.19 
               
         Final work:
                presentation
                poster (instructions)
                paper  (instructions)
                checklist for final report

Project ideas
        National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (Basic research)
                    Transformative basic research at NINDS: A case for invertebrate models systems

Cool papers for project ideas
Consciousness in a cockroach
A GABAergic Mechanism Is Necessary for Coupling Dissociable Ventral and Dorsal Regional Oscillators within the Circadian Clock
Context Odor Presentation during Sleep Enhances Memory in Honeybees
Unraveling the Evolutionary Determinants of Sleep

Effects of aging on behavior and leg kinematics during locomotion in two species of cockroach
The Neural Basis of Dominance Hierarchy Formation in Crayfish
Coordinated Righting Behaviour in Locusts
Use of bilateral information to determine the walking direction during orientation to a pheromone source in the silkmoth Bombyx mori
Intersegmental Coordination: Influence of a Single Walking Leg on the Neighboring Segments in the Stick Insect Walking System
D-amphetamine stimulates unconditioned exploration/approach behaviors in crayfish: Towards a conserved evolutionary function of ancestral drug reward
Drug-sensitive reward in crayfish: An invertebrate model system for the study of SEEKING, reward, addiction, and withdrawal
Neuronal Processing of Chemical Information in Crustaceans
Neuropsychology of Learning and Memory in Teleost Fish
Learning, memorizing and apparent forgetting of chemical cues from new predators by Iberian green frog tadpoles
Correlates of Sleep and Waking in Drosophila melanogaster
Foraging alters resilience/vulnerability to sleep disruption and starvation in Drosophila
The Physiology of the Tettigoniid ear (cricket hearing)
Opercular beat rate for rainbow darters Etheostoma caeruleum exposed to chemical stimuli from conspecific and heterospecific fishes
Aggression in invertebrates
Effects of ocean acidification on learning in coral reef fishes
Two different forms of arousal in Drosophila
Identification of an aggression-promoting pheromone and its receptor neurons in Drosophila