Top-Down Control of Sensorimotor Performance by Prefrontal Cortex

前额叶皮层对感觉运动性能的自上而下控制

• 批准号: 0642951
• 负责人: Mark Laubach
• 金额: $ 36万
• 依托单位: John B. Pierce Laboratory, Incorporated
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2007-06-01 至 2010-10-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0642951&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Top; Down; Control; Sensorimotor; Performance

This project will examine how a part of the brain, called the prefrontal cortex, isinvolved in controlling behavior. The prefrontal cortex controls behavior muchlike a business executive controls a company. "Top-down" control signals aresent from the prefrontal cortex to lower brain areas, such as the motor cortex, tocontrol when animals respond to external stimuli. These signals might conveyinformation to the motor cortex about the expected timing of stimuli or mightsimply control the timing of motor action by sending a "go" signal to the motorcortex. To investigate this issue, recordings of neural activity will be made inthe prefrontal and motor cortices as animals learn to time stimuli in a behavioraltask. Anatomical methods will be used to determine if conversations between theprefrontal and motor cortices occur through a special part of the motor cortex,called the premotor cortex.Intellectual merit: This project will be one of the first to examine interactions betweenneurons in prefrontal and motor areas of the cerebral cortex by recordingin the two areas simultaneously. This project is also unique in that interactionsthese areas are studied during learning. Finally, the project will be the first to resolveif the rodent premotor cortex receives information from the prefrontal cortexand thus might provide the first evidence that rodents have a cortical area that isanalogous to the premotor cortex of higher animals, including human beings.Broader impact: All experimental protocols and procedures will be made availableto the neuroscience community and the general public. A novel Linux distributionwill be developed that contains programs needed to reproduce this research.Undergraduate students will support these efforts. Students in Yale'sSummer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) program will take part inthe project and will be supervised by graduate students working in the PI's lab,who will acquire training that goes beyond normal graduate student research activities.In addition, the PI has initiated a neuroscience program for young childrenthrough a local public library and is taking part in the Neuroscientist-TeacherPartner Program of the Society for Neuroscience. All materials from the libraryprogram and the PI's interactions with local teachers will be made available athttp://spikelab.jbpierce.org.

该项目将研究大脑的一部分（称为前额叶皮层）如何控制行为。前额叶皮层控制着企业主管控制公司的行为。当动物对外部刺激反应时，“自上而下”的控制信号从前额叶皮层到较低的大脑区域（例如运动皮层）。这些信号可能会传达刺激的预期时间或可能通过向汽车皮层发送“ GO”信号来控制电动机动作时机的预期时间。为了调查此问题，随着动物学会在行为上刺激时，将在前额叶和运动皮层中进行神经活动的记录。解剖方法将用于确定通过运动皮层的特殊部分发生的乳状皮质和运动皮层之间的对话是否发生，称为前皮层。智能优点：该项目将是第一个检查cerebral Cortex preatiron和Motor的互动元素的相互作用之一。该项目也是独一无二的，因为在学习过程中研究了这一区域。最后，该项目将是第一个解决啮齿动物前皮层从前额叶皮层接收信息的项目，因此可能会提供第一个证据，证明啮齿动物在包括人类在内的高等动物的前层状皮质具有皮质区域，包括人类的影响。开发一个新颖的Linux发行版将包含重现这项研究所需的程序。高级学生将支持这些努力。 Students in Yale'sSummer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) program will take part inthe project and will be supervised by graduate students working in the PI's lab,who will acquire training that goes beyond normal graduate student research activities.In addition, the PI has initiated a neuroscience program for young childrenthrough a local public library and is taking part in the Neuroscientist-TeacherPartner Program of the Society for Neuroscience.图书馆计划中的所有材料以及PI与本地教师的互动都将提供Athttp：//spikelab.jbpierce.org。