Reinforcement Mechanisms for Learning Vocal Behaviors - Renewal - 1

项目摘要 像说话和语言这样的熟练行为是如何在整个生命过程中积极维持的，人们还不太清楚。 而且研究得还很差我们的研究计划使用鸣禽声乐学习和声乐生产，以了解 前脑回路和强化机制是如何用来获取并保持学习的 发声我们的研究帮助证明了中脑多巴胺能回路双向引导 学习歌曲的变化，其方式与它们作为奖励预测错误信号的功能一致 强化模型所设想的。在此基础上，我们将注意力转向了解基底神经节 而多巴胺能回路支持行为的终身维持。我们假设， 多巴胺能信号保护自然行为的终身维持。我们的初步研究提供了一个 瞥见中央机制足以启动长期deconstratization以前学到的， 内在强化的自然行为使用我们优化的各种尖端方法， 在鸣禽的电路审讯，我们的目标是剖析细胞和突触机制与歌曲 多巴胺能通路下游的回路节点在歌曲维持中的作用， 歌曲的非正式化。在第一个目标中，我们将测试预测性多巴胺能信号在长期中的作用。 利用光遗传学操作和多巴胺功能成像维持成年斑胸草雀的鸣叫 成年动物的活动。在第二个目标中，我们将研究歌曲的细胞和突触机制 去离子化在第三个目标中，我们将测试多巴胺能神经元下游的苍白球-丘脑回路的作用。 纹状体通路在执行和救援的歌曲deconstructionization。总之，这些研究可以提供 基本的和机械的见解，大脑如何不断监测和更新行为，以维持 专家的表现，并揭示当这个过程出错时会发生什么。

PROJECT SUMMARY How skilled behaviors like speech and language are actively maintained throughout life is not well understood and still poorly studied. Our research program uses songbird vocal learning and vocal production to understand how forebrain circuits and reinforcement mechanisms are used to acquire and then maintain learned vocalizations. Our research has helped demonstrate that midbrain dopaminergic circuits bidirectionally guide learned changes in song in a manner consistent with them functioning as reward prediction error signals envisaged by reinforcement models. Building from this, we turn our attention to understand how the basal ganglia and dopaminergic circuits support the lifelong maintenance of behavior. We hypothesize that predictive dopaminergic signals safeguard the lifelong maintenance of natural behaviors. Our initial studies provide a glimpse at central mechanisms sufficient to initiate the long term decrystallization of a previously learned and internally reinforced natural behavior. Using a variety of cutting-edge approaches that we have optimized for circuit interrogation in songbirds, we aim to dissect the cellular and synaptic mechanisms associated with song decrystallization, and the role of circuit nodes downstream of dopaminergic pathways in song maintenance and song decrystallization. In the first aim we will test the role of predictive dopaminergic signals in the long-term maintenance of adult zebra finch song using optogenetic manipulations and functional imaging of dopamine activity in adult animals. In the second aim we will examine the cellular and synaptic mechanisms of song decrystallization. In the third aim we will test the role of pallidal-thalamic circuits downstream of dopaminergic striatal pathways in the implementation and rescue of song decrystallization. Together, these studies can provide fundamental and mechanistic insights into how the brain continuously monitors and updates behavior to maintain expert performance and reveal what happens when this process goes awry.