Neural mechanisms of auditory temporal pattern perception

项目摘要/摘要： 处理声音通信信号是最困难的，但也是最重要的能力之一，听觉 系统必须实现。这些能力是语言和语音处理的核心，它们的成功或 失败可能会对一生的生活质量产生深远的影响。了解神经生物学 支持这些基本能力的机制也有望推动辅助听力设备的发展 改善对学习障碍和沟通障碍的诊断和治疗，如听力障碍 加工障碍、阅读障碍和特殊语言障碍。虽然人们已经了解了很多关于基因座的知识 在人类中使用非侵入性神经科学技术进行与语言相关的处理，这些技术 无法回答单个神经元和神经回路如何实现与语言相关的计算。作为一名 结果，支持声学的显式细胞电路级和神经计算机制 人们对通信信号处理知之甚少。多项研究表明，鸣禽可以 为研究与语言相关的共享听觉处理能力提供了一个极好的模型 特别是通信信号内的时间模式的处理。这篇文章中概述的实验 建议研究听觉时间模式加工的神经机制。在人类身上，这种转变 相邻语音(音素)之间的统计可以帮助或改变音素分类，提供 语言学习者和听者消除感知上相似发音的歧义的提示。对过渡的敏感性 然而，统计并不是语音信号所独有的，它反映了许多人共享的一般听觉过程 动物。在目标1中，我们考察了中国人对复杂听觉对象的范畴知觉。 动物模型中的大脑皮层神经元，并询问这些神经表征如何受时间的影响 背景。除了在序列中出现哪些元素之外，语音处理还需要知道在哪里 这些元素就会出现。对语音序列的统计规则的敏感性是长期建立的 在婴儿学习说话之前，并在整个过程中继续影响识别和理解 成人期。目标2的研究集中在单个神经元如何编码序列特定的信息和 听觉皮质中的神经细胞群。在目标3中，我们提出了一个基本电路，在该电路中，布居水平 听觉对象的表征可以通过图案化规则进行不同的调制，并对此进行了测试 图案处理电路使用直接、随意的操作。拟议的方法允许在以下方面取得进展 建立基础语言相关能力的基本神经生物学基础的近期目标 以及一个通用的框架，在这个框架内可以提出更复杂的、独特的人类过程，并 最终进行了测试。

Project Summary/Abstract: Processing acoustic communication signals is among the most difficult, yet vital capabilities that the auditory system must achieve. These abilities lie at the heart of language and speech processing, and their success or failure can have profound impacts on quality of life across the lifespan. Understanding the neurobiological mechanisms that support these basic abilities holds promise for advancing assistive listening devices, as well as improving diagnoses and treatments for learning disabilities and communication disorders such as auditory processing disorder, dyslexia, and specific language impairment. While much has been learned about the loci of language-related processing using non-invasive neuroscience techniques in humans, these techniques cannot answer how individual neurons and neural circuits implement language-relevant computations. As a result, the explicit cellular circuit-level and neuro-computational mechanisms that support acoustic communication signal processing are poorly understood. Multiple lines of research suggest that songbirds can provide an excellent model for investigating shared auditory processing abilities relevant to language, in particular the processing of temporal patterns within communication signals. The experiments outlined in this proposal investigate the neural mechanisms of auditory temporal pattern processing. In humans, the transition statistics between adjacent speech sounds (phonemes) can aid or alter phoneme categorization, providing cues for language learners and listeners to disambiguate perceptually similar sounds. Sensitivity to transition statistics is not exclusive to speech signals however, but reflects general auditory processes shared by many animals. In Aim 1 we investigate the categorical perception of complex auditory objects in populations of cortical neurons in an animal model, and ask how these neural representations are effected by temporal context. In addition to which elements occur in a sequence, speech processing also requires knowing where those elements occur. Sensitivities to the statistical regularities of speech sequences are established long before infants learn to speak, and continue to affect both recognition and comprehension throughout adulthood. Studies in Aim 2 focus on how sequence-specific information is encoded by single neurons and neural populations in auditory cortex. In Aim 3, we propose a basic circuit in which population level representations of auditory objects could be differentially modulated by patterning rules, and test this proposed pattern processing circuit using direct, casual manipulations. The proposed approach permits progress in the near term towards establishing the basic neurobiological substrates of foundational language-relevant abilities and a general framework within which more complex, uniquely human processes, can be proposed and eventually tested.