TY - JOUR
T1 - Whisker-Mediated Touch System in Rodents
T2 - From Neuron to Behavior
AU - Adibi, Mehdi
N1 - Funding Information:
The author would like to thank the members of the Tactile Perception and Learning Lab, SISSA, Italy and the Neural Coding Lab, JCSMR, ANU, Australia, particularly Mathew Diamond and Ehsan Arabzadeh for their comments. The author would like to express gratitude to all people who supported this work at the University of New South Wales and the University of Padova. The author also would like to thank Nelly Redolfi for the inspiration and support to complete this work. Funding. MA is supported by an CJ Martin Early Career Fellowship (GNT1110421) from the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council (NMHRC).
Publisher Copyright:
© Copyright © 2019 Adibi.
Copyright:
Copyright 2019 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2019/8/21
Y1 - 2019/8/21
N2 - A key question in systems neuroscience is to identify how sensory stimuli are represented in neuronal activity, and how the activity of sensory neurons in turn is “read out” by downstream neurons and give rise to behavior. The choice of a proper model system to address these questions, is therefore a crucial step. Over the past decade, the increasingly powerful array of experimental approaches that has become available in non-primate models (e.g., optogenetics and two-photon imaging) has spurred a renewed interest for the use of rodent models in systems neuroscience research. Here, I introduce the rodent whisker-mediated touch system as a structurally well-established and well-organized model system which, despite its simplicity, gives rise to complex behaviors. This system serves as a behaviorally efficient model system; known as nocturnal animals, along with their olfaction, rodents rely on their whisker-mediated touch system to collect information about their surrounding environment. Moreover, this system represents a well-studied circuitry with a somatotopic organization. At every stage of processing, one can identify anatomical and functional topographic maps of whiskers; “barrelettes” in the brainstem nuclei, “barreloids” in the sensory thalamus, and “barrels” in the cortex. This article provides a brief review on the basic anatomy and function of the whisker system in rodents.
AB - A key question in systems neuroscience is to identify how sensory stimuli are represented in neuronal activity, and how the activity of sensory neurons in turn is “read out” by downstream neurons and give rise to behavior. The choice of a proper model system to address these questions, is therefore a crucial step. Over the past decade, the increasingly powerful array of experimental approaches that has become available in non-primate models (e.g., optogenetics and two-photon imaging) has spurred a renewed interest for the use of rodent models in systems neuroscience research. Here, I introduce the rodent whisker-mediated touch system as a structurally well-established and well-organized model system which, despite its simplicity, gives rise to complex behaviors. This system serves as a behaviorally efficient model system; known as nocturnal animals, along with their olfaction, rodents rely on their whisker-mediated touch system to collect information about their surrounding environment. Moreover, this system represents a well-studied circuitry with a somatotopic organization. At every stage of processing, one can identify anatomical and functional topographic maps of whiskers; “barrelettes” in the brainstem nuclei, “barreloids” in the sensory thalamus, and “barrels” in the cortex. This article provides a brief review on the basic anatomy and function of the whisker system in rodents.
KW - barrel field
KW - rodents
KW - somatosensory
KW - thalamic barreloids
KW - vibrissae
KW - vibrissal system
KW - whisker system
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85072738249&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.3389/fnsys.2019.00040
DO - 10.3389/fnsys.2019.00040
M3 - Review Article
C2 - 31496942
AN - SCOPUS:85072738249
SN - 1662-5137
VL - 13
JO - Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience
JF - Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience
M1 - 40
ER -