Neurons, Networks, and Motor Behavior (Computational Neuroscience) - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0262692279 ISBN 13: 9780262692274

Publisher: Bradford Books, 1999

Synopsis

Recent advances in motor behavior research rely on detailed knowledge of the characteristics of the neurons and networks that generate motor behavior. At the cellular level, Neurons, Networks, and Motor Behavior describes the computational characteristics of individual neurons and how these characteristics are modified by neuromodulators. At the network and behavioral levels, the volume discusses how network structure is dynamically modulated to produce adaptive behavior. Comparisons of model systems throughout the animal kingdom provide insights into general principles of motor control. Contributors describe how networks generate such motor behaviors as walking, swimming, flying, scratching, reaching, breathing, feeding, and chewing. An emerging principle of organization is that nervous systems are remarkably efficient in constructing neural networks that control multiple tasks and dynamically adapt to change.The volume contains six sections: selection and initiation of motor patterns; generation and formation of motor patterns: cellular and systems properties; generation and formation of motor patterns: computational approaches; modulation and reconfiguration; short-term modulation of pattern generating circuits; and sensory modification of motor output to control whole body orientation.

About this title

About the Author:

Sten Grillner is Director of the Nobel Institute for Neurophysiology at the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm.

Review:

Unlike conference proceedings that consist solely of technical reports,this book would be more accurately described as a seminar on motor controloffered by luminaries in the field. Every chapter has obviously beenwritten with the nonspecialist in mind, usually providing background andexplanations of technical terms that make the subject more accessible tostudents and to those in other fields who wish to understand current issuesin motor control.... All in all, this book should serve as a useful primerof contemporary research on motor systems for some years to come.

(Fred Delcomyn The Quarterly Review of Biology)

This is not just another 'meeting' book, but rather an artfully crafted,tightly edited state of the art description of the molecules, cells, systems and underlying network operations of the motor systems from leeches to insects to tetrapods to primates. If you've not followed the enormous progress that this community has achieved, there's no better place to start.

(Floyd E. Bloom, M.D., Chairman, Department of Neuropharmacology, TheScripps Research Institute)

About this edition

• Publisher: Bradford Books
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0262692279
• ISBN 13: 9780262692274
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 320
• Editor: Stein Paul S. G., Grillner Sten, Selverston Allen I., Stuart Douglas G.