Neuroethology

The Neuroethology ( Behavioral Neuroscience; occasionally also: Behavioral Physiology ) is a young branch of biology and combines the methods of behavioral research with those of neurology, neurobiology and sensory physiology. Early representatives of the behavioral physiology were Karl von Frisch and Erich von Holst

Are investigated in this field - today usually at the level of individual cells or groups of cells the smallest possible -. , The mechanisms by which nervous systems generate behavior and control This includes, inter alia, the reception of stimuli from the environment (eg, light, chemical signals, pressure stimuli), whose forwarding to the central nervous system or comparable processing centers as well as all aspects of the response to an external stimulus (eg, muscle movements, vocalizations, excretion of pheromones ). So the neuroethology studies the details of all the elements of the " wiring diagram " of behavior including "input" and "output".

A typical example of such studies is now analyzing the behavior of lobsters, the considerable distances can erriechen potential food (for example, dead animals ) under water and serve as a model organism for the analysis of olfactory behavior ( olfactory behavior). Although competent in lobsters for the smelling nerve cells are connected in far less complex than in vertebrates, little is known about the interaction of stimulus-sensitive cells in their antennae and their legs, leading to the brain nerve cells as well as the implementation of sensations in purposeful movements.

Non- vertebrates are often preferred by neuroethologists as experimental animals vertebrates, because the analysis of sensory abilities often makes first turning off the stimulus-sensitive institutions is needed, that is: the amputation; Experiments on lobsters or other crustaceans awaken here regularly less criticism than similar experiments on mice or rats. However, it is distinguished from a trend to study neuroethologicher questions on vertebrate animals.

Was founded in 1981 on the occasion organized at the University of Kassel by Jörg -Peter Ewert, DJ Ingle and RR Capranica NATO Advanced Study Institute Advances in Vertebrate neuroethology the International Society for neuroethology ( ISN). Its first president was Theodore Holmes Bullock. The first congress of the ISN was held in 1986 in Tokyo.

Neuroethology Textbooks

• Zupanc, GKH (2004): Behavioral Neurobiology: An Integrative Approach. Oxford University Press. New York.
• Simmons, P., Young, D. (1999): Nerve Cells and Animal Behaviour. 2nd. Edn. Cambridge University Press. New York.
• Camhi J. (1984 ): neuroethology: Nerve Cells and the Natural Behavior of Animals. Sinauer Associates.
• Guthrie, DM ( 1980): neuroethology: An Introduction. Wiley, New York.
• Ewert, J.-P. (1980 ): neuroethology: An Introduction to the Neurophysiological Fundamentals of Behavior. Springer -Verlag. New York.
• Ewert, J.-P. (1976 ): Neuroethology: Introduction to the neurophysiological basis of behavior. HT 181 Springer -Verlag, Heidelberg, Berlin, New York.
• Marler, P., Hamilton WJ (1966 ): Mechanisms of Animal Behavior. John Wiley & Sons Inc., New York.