Staras, Kevin, Kemenes, György and Benjamin, Paul R (1999) Cellular traces of behavioural classical conditioning can be recorded at several sites in a simple nervous system. Journal of Neuroscience, 19 (1). pp. 347-357. ISSN 0270-6474

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Abstract

We used a behavioral learning paradigm followed by electrophysiological analysis to find sites in the Lymnaea feeding network in which electrical changes could be recorded after appetitive conditioning. Specifically, we analyzed conditioning-induced changes in cellular responses in the mechanosensory conditioned stimulus (CS) pathway, in the central pattern generator (CPG) network, and in feeding motoneurons. During training, experimental animals received 15 pairings of lip touch (the CS) with sucrose (the unconditioned stimulus, US). Control animals received 15 random CS and US presentations. Electrophysiological tests on semi-intact preparations made from conditioned animals demonstrated a network correlate of the overall feeding conditioned response, a touch-evoked CPG-driven fictive feeding rhythm. At the motoneuronal level, we found significant conditioning-induced increases in the amplitude of an early touch-evoked EPSP and spike activity, recorded from the B3 feeding motoneuron. Increases in EPSP amplitude and motoneuronal spike activity could occur independently of conditioned fictive feeding. These changes in response recorded at the level of CPG interneurons, and motoneurons were preceded by changes recorded in the CS pathway. This was demonstrated by recording a conditioning-induced increase in the number of touch-evoked spikes in the cerebrobuccal connective, which forms part of the CS pathway. The finding that electrophysiological changes after conditioning can be recorded at multiple sites in this simple system provided an important intermediate level of analysis between whole animal behavior and cellular studies on the synaptic sites of plasticity.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	A memory trace was shown to be represented in the global output of many different types of neuron within the same network with many different sites of plasticity likely to be involved
Schools and Departments:	School of Life Sciences > Neuroscience
Depositing User:	Kevin Staras
Date Deposited:	06 Feb 2012 18:24
Last Modified:	02 Jul 2019 21:51
URI:	http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/16139

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