Coordination Funds

协调基金

• 批准号: 464985141
• 负责人: Professorin Dr. Ileana L. Hanganu-Opatz
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Institut für Entwicklungsneurophysiologie
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Units
• 资助国家: 德国
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/464985141?language=en
• 关键词: Coordination; Funds

Our environment is constantly changing. Successful survival under these conditions implies that our behavior has to be flexible as well. We experience different places and contexts, have to conduct different tasks in a rapid sequence and need to constantly develop and re-arrange acting strategies. These abilities are not inherited, but develop with age and their regression forms the core of several pathologies. It is commonly held that in mammalian species the prefrontal cortex (PFC) is the hub brain area accounting for the flexibility of minds (i.e. cognitive flexibility). A fundamental aim of neuroscience is to decipher the dynamic principles that govern the ability to cope with a permanently changing environment. However, experimental achievement of this aim has proven notoriously difficult, since appropriate methods to monitor and selectively manipulate the activity of single neurons or neuronal ensembles in behaving animals were lacking. The impressive technological and analytical development during the last years enables now to address crucial questions: Which neuronal underpinnings control cognitive flexibility? Does the lack of stereotyped specialization or the connectivity patterns in PFC account for flexibility? Are the neural codes and computational mechanisms of flexibility common across mammalian species despite the apparent lack of prefrontal homology? In a coordinated and interdisciplinary research effort spanning complementary research expertise in different species, concepts, and methodologies, the Research Unit 5159 aims to understand how prefrontal circuits code and compute well-defined aspects of cognitive flexibility (i.e. working memory and decision making). The working hypothesis is that, for these abilities, neuronal ensembles in functionally homologous areas of PFC from different species are formed through temporal coordination defined by outputs and inputs. Experimental results from similar monitoring and manipulation of prefrontal circuits will be integrated into computational models with the aim of revealing overarching neuro-dynamical principles of cognitive flexibility that are common to rodents, monkeys, and humans, on the one hand, and the species-specific specialization of prefrontal coding, on the other hand. To foster efficient binding of conceptual and methodological expertise within the consortium, common work packages (and corresponding co-worker exchange) between labs are defined in each project. On a medium- to long-term scale the Research Unit will identify the neuronal mechanisms, which control behavioral flexibility across species and life span (1st funding period) and will elucidate the link between circuit miswiring and disease-relevant cognitive deficits (2nd funding period).

我们的环境在不断变化。在这些条件下成功生存意味着我们的行为也必须灵活。我们经历不同的地方和环境，必须在快速的顺序中执行不同的任务，需要不断发展和重新安排行动策略。这些能力不是遗传的，而是随着年龄的增长而发展的，它们的退化形成了几种疾病的核心。人们普遍认为，在哺乳动物物种中，前额叶皮层（PFC）是大脑中枢区域，负责思维的灵活性（即认知灵活性）。神经科学的一个基本目标是破译支配人类应对不断变化的环境的能力的动态原理。然而，这一目标的实验实现已被证明是非常困难的，因为缺乏适当的方法来监测和选择性地操纵行为动物的单个神经元或神经元群的活动。在过去的几年里，令人印象深刻的技术和分析的发展使我们现在能够解决关键的问题：哪些神经元基础控制认知灵活性？PFC中缺乏模式化的专门化或连接模式是灵活性的原因吗？尽管明显缺乏前额叶同源性，但在哺乳动物物种中，灵活性的神经编码和计算机制是共同的吗？在协调和跨学科的研究工作中，跨越了不同物种，概念和方法的互补研究专长，研究单元5159旨在了解前额叶回路如何编码和计算认知灵活性（即工作记忆和决策）的定义良好的方面。工作假设是，对于这些能力，来自不同物种的PFC功能同源区域的神经元集合是通过输出和输入定义的时间协调形成的。对前额叶回路的类似监测和操作的实验结果将被整合到计算模型中，以揭示啮齿动物、猴子和人类共同的认知灵活性的总体神经动力学原理，以及前额叶编码的物种特异性，另一方面。为了在联盟中促进概念和方法专业知识的有效结合，在每个项目中定义实验室之间的公共工作包（以及相应的同事交换）。在中长期范围内，研究单位将确定控制跨物种和寿命的行为灵活性的神经元机制（第一个资助期），并将阐明电路错误连接和疾病相关认知缺陷之间的联系（第二个资助期）。