Neural and Hormonal Mechanisms of Vocal Communication

了解激素如何影响神经系统有助于揭示大脑如何控制社会行为，如发声（声音产生）。对鱼类简单神经系统的研究表明，激素显著影响单个神经元的活动水平和发声行为背后的神经元与神经元的相互作用。在鱼类中，发声机制和行为在很大程度上是在一个被称为海军军官候补生的群体中进行研究的。这些研究是由最近的发现，自然发生的日常变化，在海军军官候补生的声乐行为是由日常变化的声乐神经元的活动。其他研究表明，类固醇激素，如雄激素和神经化学物质，如γ-氨基丁酸（GABA），在脊椎动物神经系统中的主要抑制性神经递质，诱导发声神经元活动的变化，模仿日常的发声行为的变化。神经生理学，分子和行为的方法将测试的假设，每天的变化，在发声神经元活动和发声行为取决于雄激素，GABA和激素褪黑激素的行动，深刻影响日常行为的节奏在脊椎动物。所确定的原则将适用于其他脊椎动物群体，因为声音，神经和激素机制在鱼类和其他脊椎动物，包括鸟类和哺乳动物之间是进化上保守的。这项研究已经并将继续培养来自不同文化背景和地理区域的本科生，研究生和博士后学生，并通过出版物，新闻采访和专业协会，大学，海洋生物实验室和当地社区科学中心的演讲，使研究成果易于向公众开放。

Understanding how hormones influence the nervous system helps reveal how the brain controls social behaviors like vocalization (sound production). Investigations of the simpler nervous system of fishes demonstrate that hormones dramatically influence the activity levels of individual neurons and neuron-to-neuron interactions underlying vocal behavior. Among fishes, vocal mechanisms and behaviors have largely been studied in one group known as midshipman. These studies are guided by the recent discovery that naturally occurring daily variation in midshipman vocal behavior is determined by daily changes in the activity of vocal neurons. Other studies in midshipman show that steroid hormones such as androgens and neurochemicals such as gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), the major inhibitory neurotransmitter in the vertebrate nervous system, induce changes in vocal neuron activity that mimic daily changes in vocal behavior. Neurophysiological, molecular and behavioral methods will test the hypotheses that daily changes in vocal neuron activity and vocal behavior depend on the actions of androgens, GABA, and the hormone melatonin that profoundly influences daily behavioral rhythms in vertebrates. The principles identified will apply to other vertebrate groups because vocal, neural and hormonal mechanisms are evolutionarily conserved between fishes and other vertebrates, including birds and mammals. This research has and will continue to train undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral students from diverse cultural backgrounds and geographic regions and make the results of the research easily accessible to the general public through publications, press interviews and presentations at professional societies, universities, marine biology laboratories and local community science centers.