BEHAVIORAL AND PHYSIOLOGICAL MECHANISMS OF OLFACTION

这项计划的目的是评估动物是如何学习 气味和气味混合物。 所有的动物，包括人类，都必须学会 注意感官刺激最相关的方面。 关于 气味，相关方面有时是复杂的配置 （混合物）许多单独的气味分子类型。 然而，在其他 时间单个元素或次混合物提供最相关的 生物信息，这些元素必须被检测到， 复杂多变的背景气味。 蜜蜂是一种极好的 模型动物用来评估动物一般如何解决这些问题， 问题蜜蜂工作者很容易学会将气味与 简短的强化 此外，他们可以团队解决这两个元素 和日常学习问题的行为模式， 严格控制刺激和生理操作。 这 这项工作将具有普遍适用性的生物医学研究，因为 昆虫外周器官的解剖学和生理学相似性 与人类的嗅觉处理神经柱相比。 这些相似之处 可能是通过趋同进化产生的，这意味着一个重要的 无脊椎动物和哺乳动物嗅觉功能相似 处理.因此，使用蜜蜂这样的动物， 突出可以普遍检验重要功能假设 在哺乳动物中。 提案中概述的工作将评估理论 来自刺激中的基本学习模型的预测 混合物。 此外，药物操作的药物， 叶，是哺乳动物嗅球的功能类似物， 将被用来测试关于气味如何在 神经系统疾病

The objective of this proposal is to evaluate how animals learn about odors and odor mixtures. All animals, including humans, must learn to attend to the most relevant aspects of sensory stimuli. In regard to odors, the relevant aspect is sometimes complex configurations (mixtures) of many individual odorant molecular types. Yet at other time individual elements or submixtures provide the most relevant biological information, and these elements must be detected against complex and variable background odors. The honey bee is an excellent model animal to use to evaluate how animals in general solve these problems. Honey bee workers readily learn to associate an odor with brief reinforcement. Furthermore, they can team solve both elemental and configural learning problems in a behavioral paradigm that permits rigorous control of stimulation and physiological manipulation. This work will have general applicability to biomedical research because of the anatomical and physiological similarity of the insect peripheral olfactory processing neuropils to those of humans. These similarities may have arisen via convergent evolution, which implies an important functional analogy between invertebrate and mammalian olfactory processing. Thus use of an animal such as the honey bee stands to highlight important functional hypotheses that can be generally tested in mammals. The work outlined in the proposal will evaluate theoretical predictions that stem from models of elemental learning in stimulus mixtures. In addition, pharmacological manipulation of the Antennal Lobe, which is the functional analog to the mammalian Olfactory Bulb, will be used to test predictions about how odors are represented in that neuropil.