CAREER: The Neurobiology of Neophobia in a Wild Songbird

职业生涯：野生鸣禽恐惧症的神经生物学

基本信息

批准号：
2237423
负责人：
Christine Lattin
金额：
$ 105.01万
依托单位：
Louisiana State University
依托单位国家：
美国
项目类别：
Continuing Grant
财政年份：
2023
资助国家：
美国
起止时间：
2023-05-01 至 2028-04-30
项目状态：
未结题

来源：
https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2237423&HistoricalAwards=false
关键词：
CAREER Neurobiology Neophobia Wild Songbird

项目摘要

Because novel urban and suburban environments are replacing natural environments on a global scale, neophobia, or an animal’s fearful response to novel objects, foods, or environments, is a behavior with critical relevance for wild populations. In many species, including humans, different individuals respond very differently to novelty. However, it is still poorly understood what causes differences in neophobia among individuals. The proposed work will help fill this knowledge gap by testing whether individual variation in one key brain region, the hippocampus, can help explain individual variation in neophobia. This work will build on previous research on a well-studied wild songbird, the house sparrow, and take advantage of wide and repeatable individual variation in neophobia in this species. Through three linked research and educational aims, this research will engage a diverse population of undergraduate students in an active research program in the neurobiology of behavior, and develop a clear and replicable approach for how to combine research and teaching at a large public university. This research will also provide critical insights into how differences in neurobiology can lead to differences in behavior, and reveal how social experiences may change the brain to decrease fearful behavior towards novelty. This, in turn, will help us understand the ability of animals to adapt to environmental change. Neophobia may be particularly important in determining why some individuals, populations, and species are able to persist in human-altered landscapes while others are not. The proposed research will combine transcriptomics, molecular biology, endocrinology, neurobiology, and individual and social behavior to significantly advance our mechanistic understanding of this critical behavioral phenotype. These projects will also provide essential data about how different brain regions mediate the ways animals perceive and respond to the world, and how evolution has conserved or modified the functions of those regions and molecular mediators within those regions. The first aim will use classic experimental neuroendocrine methods to temporarily inactivate the caudal dorsomedial hippocampus and test the role of two neuroendocrine receptors (dopamine receptor 2 and estrogen receptor beta) that show expression differences in neophobic and non-neophobic birds. The second aim will use PhosphoTRAP to assess whether an observed change in neophobia in response to social learning is associated with altered novelty-seeking and anxiety-related gene expression in hippocampal neurons. The third aim will expand the scope of this research by developing a new Course-based Undergraduate Research Experience (CURE) lab through the highly successful LSU CURE program to test whether neophobia is part of a behavioral syndrome in house sparrows, and to examine gene expression in brain regions connected to the hippocampus in birds exposed to a social learning paradigm. This research is jointly funded by the Behavioral Systems Cluster, the Neural Systems Cluster; Modulation Program, and the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR).This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

由于新的城市和郊区环境正在全球范围内取代自然环境，因此恐惧症或动物对新物体、食物或环境的恐惧反应是一种与野生种群（包括人类和不同个体）密切相关的行为。然而，人们对新事物恐惧症差异的原因仍知之甚少，这项工作将通过测试大脑关键区域海马体的个体差异是否有助于解释新事物的个体差异来填补这一知识空白。这项工作将建立在新恐惧症的基础上。这项研究将利用先前对野生鸣禽（家麻雀）进行充分研究的研究，并利用该物种恐惧症的广泛且可重复的个体差异，通过三个相互关联的研究和教育目标，让不同的本科生群体积极参与。这项研究还将提供关于神经生物学差异如何导致行为差异的重要见解，并揭示如何将研究和教学结合起来。社会经历可能会改变大脑反过来，这将有助于我们了解动物适应环境变化的能力，这对于确定为什么某些个体、种群和物种能够在人类改变的景观中生存下来尤其重要。拟议的研究将结合转录组学、分子生物学、内分泌学、神经生物学以及个人和社会行为，以显着推进我们对这种关键行为表型的机械理解。这些项目还将提供有关不同大脑区域如何调节这些方式的重要数据。动物感知并对世界做出反应，以及进化如何保留或改变这些区域和这些区域内的分子介质的功能。第一个目标将使用经典的实验神经内分泌方法暂时灭活尾侧背内侧海马并测试两种神经内分泌受体的作用。多巴胺受体 2 和雌激素受体 β）在恐新症和非恐新症鸟类中表现出表达差异第二个目标将使用 PhosphoTRAP 来评估观察到的恐新症是否因社交而发生变化。学习与海马神经元中新奇寻求和焦虑相关基因表达的改变有关，第三个目标是通过非常成功的路易斯安那州立大学 CURE 项目开发一个新的基于课程的本科生研究体验 (CURE) 实验室，以扩大这项研究的范围。测试恐新症是否是麻雀行为综合症的一部分，并检查暴露于社会学习范式的鸟类与海马体相连的大脑区域的基因表达。这项研究由行为系统集群、神经系统联合资助。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。