Modeling motor behavior in the lobster stomatogastric system

Ohio University, Athens OH

Investigators

Abstract

PROJECT TITLE: Modeling Motor Behavior in the Lobster Stomatogastric System PI: Scott L. Hooper PROJECT NUMBER: IOS 0958926 Understanding how nervous systems generate behavior is a central goal of neuroscience, and much about how nervous systems work is now known. However, this knowledge is insufficient to understand how behavior is produced because nervous systems drive muscles, which in turn move the effectors (typically limbs) that produce behavior. Different muscles respond differently to nervous system input, and limbs with different anatomies respond differently to given amounts of muscle activation. Since neuro-muscular systems evolve as a unified whole, nervous system properties will vary as a function of muscle and limb properties. Understanding how nervous systems generate behavior thus requires studying the muscles and limbs that nervous systems control. The proposed work will address this issue in an extremely well-understood nervous system, the nervous system that drives the movements of the lobster stomach. The lobster stomach is more similar to vertebrate limbs than to human stomachs in that it has neurally-driven muscles and bone-like effectors called ossicles. The neural output and make-up of the stomach nervous system are completely described and a great deal about the electrical properties of its neurons is known. The stomach muscles have individual and complex responses to neural input, and a quantitative, three-dimensional description of the stomach ossicles is available. All information necessary to connect nervous system make-up and output to behavior is thus available in this system. The proposed work will characterize muscle, ossicle, and joint properties in detail so as to allow later development of a computational model of the generation of behavior in this system. Due to the analogous natures of behavior generation in this and many other systems noted above, conclusions from this work should be widely applicable, including to understanding how human nervous systems generate movement. The proposed work will also provide training on both undergraduate and post-doctoral levels.