Behavior and Its Neural Control in Gastropod Molluscs

This book presents a thorough scholarly review of gastropod neurobiology presenting what is known about identified nerve cells, neural circuits, and behavior. Aplysia has been a major early model for work on basic mechanisms of learning and memory, and this model system will be covered in depth as the major focus of the book. There are about six other molluscan models, including Helix, Lymnaea, Limax, Achatina, and Tritonia, and Bulla, in which significant neurobiological research has been done, and they are all covered in appropriate depth. Chase brings a rather rich knowledge of the integrative biology of these systems to this book which should help many neurobiologists to reach a fuller organismal perspective on the behaviors they investigate.

Ronald Chase is Professor Emeritus at McGill University in Montreal. He received a B.A. degree from Stanford University, dropped out of Harvard Law School, and later earned a Ph.D. in Psychology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. After postdoctoral research in Munich and Seattle, he moved to Montreal in 1971, where he taught neurobiology in the Department of Biology at McGill University. During his research career of 38 years, he published over 80 peer-reviewed articles on snail brains and snail sex. In addition to Behavior and its Neural Control in Gastropod Molluscs, Dr. Chase has written three books about mental illness: The Physical Basis of Mental Illness, Schizophrenia: A Brother Finds Answers in Biological Science, and The Making of Modern Psychiatry.