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At least 613 records · Page 34Linked to original sources
PubMed2000

A study of orientation in a zero gravity environment by means of virtual reality simulation.

When the International Space Station (ISS) is completed and starts its operation, crew members will be stationed for three months or more in orbit aboard the ISS. As they stay longer in the space environment, "habitability" for them will become most important in the design of the interior space. One of the problems about habitability in a zero gravity (0 G) environment is disorientation. Crew members have difficulty in discriminating between "up" and "down" and more serious disorientations may cause space motion sickness. Crew members rely on visual perception to orient themselves because they can't use their sense of equilibrium in a 0 G environment. Although color and the direction of equipment of Space Shuttles or modules has been considered, no systematic study has been conducted on interior space. This study intended to clarify how people acquire visual information and recognize their orientation in a 0 G environment by an experiment in which a subject wears a head-mounted display (HMD) and enters a virtual weightless state represented by computer graphics (CG). Visual information of a room and the degree-of-freedom of motion were varied to examine the influence of the conditions on such a simple task as movement through several connected modules, and the performance and the behavior of each subject were investigated.

Humans↗
PubMed1999

Anxiety and increased 5-HT1A receptor response in NCAM null mutant mice.

Mice deficient in the neural cell adhesion molecule (NCAM) show behavioral abnormalities as adults, including altered exploratory behavior, deficits in spatial learning, and increased intermale aggression. Here, we report increased anxiety-like behavior of homozygous (NCAM-/-) and heterozygous (NCAM/-) mutant mice in a light/dark avoidance test, independent of genetic background and gender. Anxiety-like behavior was reduced in both NCAM+/+ and NCAM-/- mice by systemic administration of the benzodiazepine agonist diazepam and the 5-HT1A receptor agonists buspirone and 8-OH-DPAT. However, NCAM-/- mice showed anxiolytic-like effects at lower doses of buspirone and 8-OH-DPAT than NCAM+/+ mice. Such increased response to 5-HT1A receptor stimulation suggests a functional change in the serotonergic system of NCAM-/- mice, likely involved in the control of anxiety and aggression. However, 5-HT1A receptor binding and tissue content of serotonin and its metabolite 5-hydroxyindolacetic acid were found unaltered in every brain area of NCAM-/- mice investigated, indicating that expression of 5-HT1A receptors as well as synthesis and release of serotonin are largely unchanged in NCAM-/- mice. We hypothesize a critical involvement of endogenous NCAM in serotonergic transmission via 5-HT1A receptors and inwardly rectifying K+ channels as the respective effector systems.

8-Hydroxy-2-(di-n-propylamino)tetralin↗
PubMed1999

Learned interaction of visual and idiothetic cues in the control of place field orientation.

In a symmetrical environment (like a square box) hippocampal place cells use a mixture of visual and idiothetic (movement) information to tell them which way the environment is oriented. The present experiment tested the hypothesis that if the visual landmarks were mobile, place cells would learn to disregard these and rely on idiothetic cues instead. Place cells were recorded in a square box surrounded by circular black curtains. A cue card hung on the curtain behind one of the walls to break the fourfold symmetry. The relative influence of this card on the location of place fields was assessed each day by confining the rat on a rotating platter underneath an opaque cover, and then rotating the card and the platter by different amounts, to see whether subsequently recorded place fields had rotated with the card or with the rat. For some rats, these trials had been preceded by trials in which the card had been visibly moved from trial to trial, so that the rats had seen that it was mobile. Other rats received no prior visual information that the card was mobile. In the rats that had previously seen the card move, place fields initially rotated with the card but by the end of five sessions usually rotated with the rat instead. For rats that had never seen the card move, place fields always followed the card. Thus, the cells were able to "learn" that their preferred directional input, the card, was unreliable. A third group of rats, who were covered only for 30 s while the card was moved, showed mixed behaviour, suggesting a degradation of the idiothetic trace with time.

Animals↗
PubMed2003

Behavior of the gray short-tailed opossum (Monodelphis domestica) in the open field and in response to a new object, in comparison with the rat.

We compared the behavior of the gray short-tailed opossums (Monodelphis domestica) and Long-Evans rats during repeated exposures to the open-field (OF) test. Animals were videotaped for 10 min on four consecutive days. A new object was placed in the center of the field on the third day and it was present there again on the fourth day. The rate of locomotor activity in the opossum was always higher than that in the rat. On the first exposure to the open field, both species showed strong thigmotaxy. On the second day, opossums shifted a significant part of their activity to the internal and central parts of the field, while thigmotaxy dominated in the rats' behavior till the end of the experiment. The frequency and time of exploration of a new object placed on the central square was higher in the opossums than in rats. They also showed higher frequency of rearings and lower defecation scores, while the time of grooming was similar to the rats'. These results, that are consistent with those of our earlier experiments in the elevated plus maze (EPM), show that in response to novelty Monodelphis opossums change their behavior from defensive to exploratory faster than rats and then explore it more intensely. These differences may be either a result of different ecologies or evolution of the two species.

Animals↗
PubMed2000

Non-random patterns of host use by the different parasite species exploiting a cockle population.

Different parasite species sharing the same intermediate host species may have similar or conflicting interests, depending on whether they are at the same stage in their life-cycle or whether they share the same definitive host. In the New Zealand cockle, Austrovenus stutchburyi, metacercariae of the digenean Meiogymnophallus sp. are positively associated with metacercariae of Curtuteria australis. This relationship is found in different cockle samples, and is independent of cockle shell size, which suggests that it is not merely the product of metacercariae accumulation over time. Both digenean species have the same definitive host, oystercatchers. Metacercariae of C. australis manipulate the phenotype of cockles, impairing the cockle's ability to burrow in the sediments. This makes the host more susceptible to oystercatcher predation. Thus Meiogymnophallus sp. can benefit by associating with C. australis and may hitch a ride with the manipulator parasite. This is supported by the finding that cockles impaired by C. australis and lying at the sediment surface harbour greater numbers of Meiogymnophallus than buried cockles. A third digenean species, whose sporocysts are found in cockles and which is not transmitted by predation, occurred only in surface cockles. Finally, a parasitic copepod with a direct life-cycle was found evenly distributed among buried and surface cockles, independently of their metacercarial loads. These results show that different parasite species do not use cockles in a random fashion, and that not all patterns of host use are consistent with shared or conflicting interests among parasites.

Animals↗
PubMed2001

A two-platform task reveals a deficit in the ability of rats to return to the start location in the water maze.

The ability of rats to return to the start location was examined with a 4-arm radial water maze. The task required rats to find 2 hidden platforms in sequence. Rats were released from 1 of 3 arms and there was a platform located in the fourth arm. Once a rat found this platform, a 2nd platform was raised in another location, which was either the start location, for 1 group, or another fixed location, for a control group. Across 3 experiments, all rats learned the location of the 1st fixed platform in 80 to 120 trials. However, rats had difficulty finding a 2nd platform if it was at the start location. Control groups revealed that rats could learn 2 platform locations and that the difficulty in learning to return to the start location did not seem to be attributable to its aversive nature. In separate groups, exposure to the start location was increased by starting the rats from an initially stable platform. Rats still did not readily learn to return to the start location. The authors suggest that start location, when varied, cannot readily be used to define the location of a hidden platform.

Animals↗
PubMed1999

Head direction cells in rats with hippocampal or overlying neocortical lesions: evidence for impaired angular path integration.

Rodents use two distinct navigation strategies that are based on environmental cues (landmark navigation) or internal cues (path integration). Head direction (HD) cells are neurons that discharge when the animal points its head in a particular direction and are responsive to the same cues that support path integration and landmark navigation. Experiment 1 examined whether HD cells in rats with lesions to the hippocampus plus the overlying neocortex or to just the overlying neocortex could maintain a stable preferred firing direction when the rats locomoted from a familiar to a novel environment, a process thought to require path integration. HD cells from both lesion groups were unable to maintain a similar preferred direction between environments, with cells from hippocampal rats showing larger shifts than cells from rats sustaining only cortical damage. When the rats first explored the novel environment, the preferred directions of the cells drifted for up to 4 min before establishing a consistent firing orientation. The preferred direction was usually maintained during subsequent visits to the novel environment but not across longer time periods (days to weeks). Experiment 2 demonstrated that a novel landmark cue was able to establish control over HD cell preferred directions in rats from both lesion groups, showing that the impairment observed in experiment 1 cannot be attributed to an impairment in establishing cue control. Experiment 3 showed that the preferred direction drifted when HD cells in lesioned animals were recorded in the dark. It was also shown that the anticipatory property of anterodorsal thalamic nucleus HD cells was still present in lesioned animals; thus, this property cannot be attributed to an intact hippocampus. These findings suggest that the hippocampus and the overlying neocortex are involved in path integration mechanisms, which enable an animal to maintain an accurate representation of its directional heading when exploring a novel environment.

Action Potentials↗
PubMed2002

Competition between memory systems: acetylcholine release in the hippocampus correlates negatively with good performance on an amygdala-dependent task.

Lesions of the amygdala impair acquisition of a food conditioned place preference (CPP) task. In contrast, lesions of the fornix facilitate acquisition on this task, showing that an intact hippocampal system can interfere with learning an amygdala-dependent task. Our recent findings indicate that acetylcholine (ACh) release in the hippocampus increases while rats perform a hippocampus-dependent spontaneous alternation task. To the extent that ACh output in the hippocampus reflects activation of that brain area in learning and memory, the results obtained with fornix lesions suggest that ACh release in the hippocampus might be negatively correlated with learning on a CPP task. Using in vivo microdialysis, release of ACh was measured in the hippocampus while rats learned and were tested on an amygdala-dependent CPP task and a hippocampus-dependent spontaneous alternation task. Release of ACh in the hippocampus increased when rats were tested on either task. The magnitude of the increase in release of hippocampal ACh was negatively correlated with good performance on the amygdala-dependent CPP task. These findings suggest that ACh release may reflect activation and participation of the hippocampus in learning and memory, but in a manner that can be detrimental to performance on a task dependent on another brain area.

Acetylcholine↗