The Ninth International Congress of Neuroethology Proposal

申请资金用于支持将于2010年8月2-7日在西班牙萨拉曼卡举行的第九届国际神经行为学大会（ICN）。由国际神经行为学学会主办的ICN从1986年开始每3年举行一次，吸引了来自世界各地的数百名研究人员。这些会议的重点是将不同的神经科学家聚集在一起，他们正在研究脊椎动物和无脊椎动物的广泛行为的神经基础。本次会议为具有广泛观点的国际科学家之间的讨论提供了一个杰出的场所，但他们关注的是对神经功能和疾病具有重要意义的常见基础科学问题。2010年的计划包括17个邀请专题讨论会，4个参与者专题讨论会，演讲者将从提交的摘要中选择，特别强调将选择研究生和博士后研究员作为演讲者。会议还将举行8场全体会议，主题包括鸟类鸣叫学习、嗅觉行为神经网络、声音交流、视觉分子进化、信息素引导行为等。虽然大会将讨论神经生物学的广泛领域，但许多主题与NIDCD的使命有关。具体来说，17场专题讨论会中的28场演讲集中于化学感觉、听觉、视听互动或语言习得或理解的比较方面及其神经基础。当参与者研讨会的演讲者被选中时，这个名单几乎肯定会增加。请支持青年研究者奖获得者、学生和少数民族神经科学家的旅行和登记，以及会议记录的传播。总的来说，对美国科学家，尤其是年轻的研究人员来说，好处是有机会接触到来自世界各地的前沿研究和技术，这种形式和场所鼓励学生和具有各种经验的研究人员之间的互动。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Funds are requested to help support the Ninth International Congress of Neuroethology (ICN) to held on August 2-7, 2010 in Salamanca, Spain. The ICN, which is organized by the International Society for Neuroethology, has been held every three years since 1986 and attracts hundreds or researchers from around the world. The focus of these meetings is to bring together diverse neuroscientists who are investigating the neural basis of behavior across a broad spectrum of both vertebrates and invertebrates. This meeting provides an outstanding venue for discussions among international scientists who have a broad range of perspectives, but who focus on common basic-science questions that have important implications for neural function and disease. The program for 2010 includes 17 invited symposia, four Participant Symposia in which the speakers will be selected from submitted abstracts where special emphasis will be given to selecting graduate students and postdoctoral fellows as presenters. There also will be 8 plenary sessions on topics such as bird song learning, neural networks for olfactory behavior, acoustic communication, molecular evolution of vision, behaviors guided by pheromones, among others. While a wide variety of areas in neurobiology will be addressed in the Congress, many of the topics are relevant to the mission of the NIDCD. Specifically, 28 talks in the 17 symposia focus on chemosensation, hearing, audio- visual interactions, or comparative aspects of language acquisition or comprehension and its neural underpinnings. The list will almost certainly grow when the speakers in the Participant Symposia are chosen. Support is requested to fund travel and registration for winners of the Young Investigator Awards, for student and minority neuroscientists, and for the dissemination of the proceedings of the conference. The benefits to American scientists in general, and to young investigators in particular, will be the opportunity for exposure to cutting-edge research and techniques from around the world in a format and venue that encourage interactions between students and investigators at all levels of experience. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The conference will address major themes in the neural mechanisms that underlie normal behavior with an emphasis on understanding the pathways in the brain that perceive sensory inputs, make major decisions and encode the appropriate movements. Many neural diseases result from defects in these processing steps. To understand the functional basis of abnormal neural function and disease states, multiple perspectives drawn from a variety of organisms are often critical. The comparative viewpoints and emerging technologies that are emphasized at the ICN therefore have the potential to contribute to the diagnosis of nervous system diseases and the development of treatments.