Hemispheric asymmetry of Calbindin-positive neurons is associated with successful song imitation
| Autor: | Alexa H. Pagliaro, Payal Arya, Sharon M. H. Gobes, Yasmin Sharbaf |
|---|---|
| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Rok vydání: | 2020 |
| Předmět: |
0301 basic medicine
Male Calbindins Echoic memory education Sensory system Inhibitory postsynaptic potential Calbindin Article Functional Laterality 03 medical and health sciences 0302 clinical medicine Animals Learning Molecular Biology Auditory Cortex Neurons biology General Neuroscience biology.organism_classification Imitative Behavior Songbird 030104 developmental biology nervous system biology.protein behavior and behavior mechanisms Nidopallium Neurology (clinical) Finches Calretinin Vocalization Animal Neuroscience 030217 neurology & neurosurgery Parvalbumin psychological phenomena and processes Developmental Biology |
| Zdroj: | Brain Res |
| Popis: | The plasticity that facilitates learning during critical (sensitive) periods in development is tightly regulated by inhibitory neurons. Song acquisition in birds is one example of a learning process that occurs during a sensitive period early in development. Sensory experience with a song ‘tutor’ during this sensitive period prunes excitatory and inhibitory synapses in the song production nucleus HVC (proper noun). Neurons in the caudomedial nidopallium (NCM), a secondary auditory region, lose their tutor-song selectivity upon blocking gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) signaling. Given the importance of inhibition in the song learning process, we investigated whether individual differences in learning outcomes can be explained by the distribution of specific populations of (mostly) inhibitory neurons in the NCM and HVC. We measured the densities of distinct neuronal populations (defined by their expression of the calcium-binding proteins Calbindin, Calretinin, and Parvalbumin) in these two regions. We found that lateralization of Calbindin-positive neurons was related to successful song learning: good learners were characterized by hemispheric asymmetry of Calbindin-positive neurons in the medial NCM (fewer CB+ neurons in the left hemisphere), whereas poor learners did not show any asymmetry. In contrast, the density of all three neuronal populations in HVC did not differ between good and poor learners. These findings not only identify a specific (presumably) inhibitory cell type (Calbindin-expressing neurons) that is related to song learning, but also emphasize the role of hemispheric asymmetry in auditory memory formation. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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