Role of Sensory Experience in Parcellation of Sensory Neocortex

感觉体验在感觉新皮质分区中的作用

• 批准号: 9511430
• 负责人: Sarah Pallas
• 金额: $ 19.44万
• 依托单位: Baylor College of Medicine
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 1995
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1995-09-01 至 1997-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9511430&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Role; Sensory; Experience; Parcellation; Neocortex

9511430 Pallas The overall goal of this research is to determine how different areas of the cerebral cortex become specialized to process different types of sensory information, and how functionally specialized brain circuitry is created from non-specialized brain tissue during development and evolution. The hypothesis being tested is that the sensory inputs received by cortex during development play a critical role in organizing specific circuits in cortex. To test this hypothesis, auditory cortex will be studied in three groups of animals; one group which has had sensory input to auditory cortex removed at birth, another group which, by a minor surgical procedure, has had visual input diverted into the auditory pathway at birth, and a third group which consists of normal, unmanipulated animals. How the circuitry of auditory cortex is affected by these manipulations of sensory experience will then be examined. Using the rewiring manipulation, it has been shown previously that auditory cortex can be "turned into" visual cortex by supplying it with visual input from birth. The question yet to be investigated is whether this occurs because the early visual inputs have changed the circuitry of auditory cortex, or because auditory cortex is so similar to visual cortex that it it has an intrinsic capability for processing visual input appropriately. Preliminary results suggest that the visual inputs do induce changes in circuitry. The circuitry of auditory cortex, then, will be examined using anatomical methods to determine exactly what these changes are and how they produce the functional changes that have been observed. Knowledge of how sensory input influences cortical circuitry during development will provide information about how evolutionary changes in sensory organs might ultimately be accommodated by the central nervous system. This research, therefore, will provide fundamental information about both cortical developmental mechanisms and the evolution o f complex structures in the central nervous system.

9511430帕拉斯这项研究的总体目标是确定大脑皮层的不同区域如何专门化以处理不同类型的感觉信息，以及在发育和进化过程中如何从非专门化的脑组织中创建功能专门化的大脑回路。正在测试的假设是，大脑皮质在发育过程中接收到的感觉输入在组织大脑皮质特定回路方面发挥着关键作用。为了验证这一假设，将在三组动物中进行听觉皮质的研究；一组在出生时移除了对听觉皮质的感觉输入，另一组在出生时通过小手术将视觉输入转移到听觉通路，第三组由正常的未经操作的动物组成。然后我们将研究这些感觉体验的操作是如何影响听觉皮质的回路的。通过重新布线操作，先前已经证明，通过从出生起向听觉皮质提供视觉输入，可以将听觉皮质“转变为”视觉皮质。有待研究的问题是，这种情况的发生是因为早期的视觉输入改变了听觉皮质的回路，还是因为听觉皮质与视觉皮质如此相似，以至于它具有适当处理视觉输入的内在能力。初步结果表明，视觉输入确实会引起电路的变化。然后，将使用解剖学方法检查听觉皮质的回路，以确定这些变化到底是什么，以及它们是如何产生已观察到的功能变化的。了解感觉输入如何影响发育过程中的皮质回路，将提供有关感觉器官的进化变化最终可能如何由中枢神经系统适应的信息。因此，这项研究将为中枢神经系统中皮质发育机制和复杂结构的进化提供基本信息。