CRCNS: Adaptive perceptual-motor feedback for the analysis of complex scenes

这个项目的主要目标是了解在复杂环境中支持感知和行动的过程。这项研究的重点是回声定位蝙蝠的空间感知和导航，回声定位蝙蝠是一种听觉专家，它会产生高频声纳信号，并监听回声回声，以确定物体在其环境中的位置。回声定位蝙蝠根据目标(昆虫猎物)和障碍物的回声信息修改声纳信号，对这种动物S的适应发声行为进行量化分析，以推断它对不断变化的环境的感知。这项研究的生物学部分结合了行为和神经生理学实验，以深入了解复杂场景中的感觉信息是如何编码并用于指导行为的。行为和神经数据的分析将与建模工作和机器人空间导航系统的开发相协调。这一研究项目的生物学和工程学分支将共同产生新的知识，有助于更深入地理解复杂的自然环境中的感知和行动。从事这个项目的学生和博士后将学习如何在生物学和工程学中转化知识和方法，范围从行为学和神经生物学到计算建模和机器人演示。这些人将做出影响基础科学和未来技术的重大贡献，使仅靠传统学科的工作无法实现的突破成为可能。这一研究项目将有助于丰富的多媒体素材库，供在私营和公共部门工作的教育工作者和科学家使用：http://www.bsos.umd.edu/psyc/batlab/movies.html.总的来说，这项研究对神经生物学、跨学科研究培训、神经科学技术、机器人学和辅助设备的设计产生了广泛的影响。

The broad goal of this project is to understand the processes that support perception and action in complex settings. The research focuses on spatial perception and navigation in the echolocating bat, an auditory specialist that produces high frequency sonar calls and listens to echo returns to determine the location of objects in its environment. The echolocating bat modifies its sonar calls in response to echo information from targets (insect prey) and obstacles, and quantitative analyses of this animal?s adaptive vocal behavior will be used to infer its perception of a changing environment. The biological component of this research combines behavioral and neurophysiological experiments to gain insight to how sensory information from complex scenes is coded and used to guide behaviors. Analysis of behavioral and neural data will be coordinated with modeling efforts and the development of a robotic spatial navigation system. Together, the biological and engineering arms of this research project will generate new knowledge that contributes to a deeper understanding of perception and action in complex, natural environments. Students and postdocs working on this project will learn to translate knowledge and methodologies across biology and engineering, ranging from ethology and neurobiology to computational modeling and robotic demonstrations. These individuals will be poised to make major contributions that impact both basic science and future technology, enabling breakthroughs that cannot be achieved through work solely within traditional disciplines. This research project will contribute to a rich library of multimedia materials that will be made available to educators and scientists working in both the private and public sectors: http://www.bsos.umd.edu/psyc/batlab/movies.html. Collectively, this research has wide-ranging impact for neurobiology, interdisciplinary research training, neuroscience techniques, robotics, and the design of assistive devices.