 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
Friday Evening Lecture Series
Forbes Lectures
July 15 & 16, 2010
Lillie Auditorium, 8:00 PM
Allison Doupe, University of California, San Francisco
Introduction on July 15 by Dr. Graeme Davis
Introduction on July 16 by Dr. Jeffrey L. Noebels
July 15, 2010 - Lecture Abstract:
“Lessons from Songbirds about Basal Ganglia Circuits, Social Context, and Plasticity”
Songbirds provide one of the few animal models for speech learning. Like humans, they must hear the sounds of adults during a sensitive period, and must hear their own voice while learning to vocalize. They also possess networks of brain regions required for song learning, including a ‘cortical’-basal ganglia circuit known as the anterior forebrain pathway (AFP). Striking trial-by-trial neural variability emerges within the AFP, carried by prominent burst firing, and creates song variability, which may be important for trial-and-error learning. This variability is markedly sensitive to social signals: the presence of a female eliminates bursting and causes reliable single-spike firing locked to song, and simultaneously switches song to a ‘performance’ state, in which the bird sings its best song version. Experimental alteration of AFP activity also eliminates adult plasticity, suggesting that patterned burst firing is an essential aspect of how this circuit changes song. Cortical-basal ganglia pathways are widely conserved across vertebrates and an important site of neurologic and psychiatric disease. Because the AFP is a discrete cortical-basal ganglia circuit specialized for a simple behavior, it is a particularly tractable model for elucidating the signals present in such circuits and their function in normal and disordered learning.
Dr. Allison Doupe is a professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Physiology at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine. She is also co-director of the Sloan-Swartz Center for Theoretical Neurobiology at UCSF and faculty in the graduate program in Neuroscience. Dr. Doupe’s laboratory is interested in how the nervous system mediates behavior, especially complex behaviors that must be learned. Birdsong provides a useful model system for the study of these issues. Song is an intricate motor act that is learned in distinct phases during a bird's life, and depends on the animal’s auditory experience. There are critical periods for song learning, just as there are for human language learning.
Dr. Doupe received a B. Sc. from McGill University in 1975 and simultaneously received a M.D. and Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1984. She has been a faculty member in the Department of Psychiatry and Physiology at UCSF since 1993.
Dr. Doupe’s dedication to the field of psychiatry and physiology has yielded numerous honors and awards. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a member of the International Society for Neuroethology, and won NARSAD Independent Investigator Award in 2003. Dr. Doupe serves on the editorial board for several journals and is a member of the Society for Neuroscience and the American Psychiatric Association.
Dr. Graeme Davis will introduce Dr. Doupe. Dr. Davis was an undergraduate at Williams College where he majored in Biology and completed an undergraduate thesis in Neuroscience under the guidance of Dr. Steven Zottoli. Dr. Davis then moved to the University of Massachusetts, Amherst for graduate school. His graduate work in the laboratory of Dr. Rodney Murphey focused on the development of synaptic connections in the invertebrate central nervous system. Dr. Davis then moved to the University of California, Berkeley, where he did postdoctoral work with Dr. Corey Goodman. In the Goodman laboratory, Dr. Davis began to combine the powerful tools of Drosophila molecular/genetics with synaptic electrophysiology to explore the molecular mechanisms that establish and modulate the functional properties of nerve and muscle. Dr. Davis then moved across San Francisco Bay, establishing his own independent research laboratory at the University of California, San Francisco in 1998. Dr. Davis has remained at UCSF and is now Albert Bowers Professor and Chairman of the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics. Dr. Davis’ laboratory continues to exploit the power of Drosophila genetics to identify new genes and signaling systems that stabilize neural function throughout the life of an organism, with implications for diverse neurological diseases. Dr. Davis has maintained a long standing connection with the Marine Biological Laboratory. He grew up spending summers in Woods Hole as a child, learning to sail at Quissett Harbor. He has been a student in the Neural Systems and Behavior Course, a Grass Fellow, a faculty member in the Neural Systems and Behavior Course and is now co-director of the Neurobiology Course.
July 16, 2010 - Lecture Abstract:
“What Songbirds Can Teach Us About Learning And The Brain”
An amazing capacity of humans is our ability to learn to speak. Songbirds provide one of the few animal models for speech learning: like humans, they must hear the sounds of adults during a sensitive period, and then must hear their own voice while learning to vocalize. They also possess networks of brain regions required for song learning, with many similarities to mammalian brains. One of these brain regions is a ‘basal ganglia’ circuit specialized for song. Basal ganglia circuits are critical for learning and control of movements in all vertebrates, and a site of many neurologic and psychiatric diseases; however, despite their importance, they remain in many ways ill understood. The study of the songbird basal ganglia pathway has shown that one of its key functions is to actively generate song variability, which may be important for trial-and-error motor learning. Moreover, this circuit is strikingly sensitive to social cues, which alter its neural activity and the resulting song. Experimental manipulations of this pathway are also revealing which aspects of its firing are crucial for learning. Because the basal ganglia circuit for song is specialized for a simple behavior, it is providing very general insights into how such circuits function, both normally and in disease.
Dr. Jeffrey L. Noebels will introduce Dr. Doupe. Dr. Noebels holds the Cullen Trust Endowed Chair in Neurogenetics, and is Professor of Neurology, Neuroscience, and Molecular and Human Genetics at Baylor College of Medicine. He is Vice Chair of Research in Neurology, and the Director of the Blue Bird Circle Developmental Neurogenetics Laboratory and the Epilepsy Research Center at Baylor. Dr. Noebels received a Ph.D. from Stanford University and a M.D. from Yale Medical School. He completed postdoctoral training in the Harvard Department of Neuropathology, Neurology residency training at Massachusetts General Hospital, and William G. Lennox and Klingenstein Fellowships at Children’s Hospital in Boston. Dr Noebels’ major research focus has been to identify genes that cause epilepsy and trace their cellular expression in the developing nervous system in order to discover new targets for therapy. He has spoken and written widely in this area, and serves on the scientific organizing committees of academic, NIH, and international organizations directed at genetics and epilepsy. He is past President of the AES, and current Chair of the Neurobiology Commission of the International League Against Epilepsy. He has received numerous awards for his research on genes and epilepsy.
About the Forbes Lectures:
Since 1959, the special two-part Forbes Lecture has been supported by The Grass Foundation, a private foundation that supports research and education in neuroscience. The lectures are given in honor of pioneering neurobiologist Alexander Forbes. Traditionally, the Forbes lecturer also spends several weeks at the MBL, working alongside the Grass Fellowship Program.
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
