Can the natural environment enhance developmental plasticity and adult adaptive behavior? Effects of naturalistic rearing environment on gene expression, adult brain organization, and behavior.

自然环境能否增强发育可塑性和成人适应行为？

• 批准号: 10706324
• 负责人: Chris S Bresee
• 金额: $ 7.42万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT DAVIS
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-09-13 至 2024-09-12
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10706324
• 关键词: Adaptive Behaviors; Adult; Affect; Animals; Behavior; Behavior assessment; Behavioral; Birth; Body part; Brain; Brain region; Cells; Complex; Data; Development; Discrimination; Electrophysiology (science); Environment; Esthesia; Exposure to; Gene Expression; Genes; Health; Hindlimb; Housing; Human; Investigation; Laboratories; Laboratory Rat; Learning; Life; Life Experience; Link; Literature; Longevity; Mammals; Maps; Measures; Mediating; Modality; Motor; Movement; Nature; Neocortex; Neuroanatomy; Neurologic; Neuronal Plasticity; Neurons; Organism; Parietal Lobe; Pattern; Performance; Phenotype; Population; Property; Rattus; Resources; Sampling; Sensory; Shapes; Siblings; Social Interaction; Somatosensory Cortex; Specific qualifier value; Stimulus; Surface; Tactile; Tail; Techniques; Testing; Texture; Time; Vibrissae; anatomical tracer; behavior test; behavioral outcome; behavioral response; cohort; cortex mapping; critical period; deprivation; developmental plasticity; experience; experimental study; flexibility; improved; learning outcome; motor behavior; multimodality; neocortical; neural; neurodevelopment; novel; receptive field; response; sensory cortex; sensory system; somatosensory; statistics

Project Summary The neocortex is a uniquely mammalian feature, one which facilitates profound behavioral flexibility. Part of this flexibility comes from the capacity of the neocortex to be shaped by early sensory and motor experience, allowing the organism to tune its sensory system to the specific problems and opportunities of the environment in which it is reared. This developmental plasticity allows an animal to then generate adaptive behavior that best meets the variable demands of its environment throughout its life. It has been well established that early sensory experience can alter the sensory or motor representation within a cortical field (cortical maps), neural response properties, and cortical and subcortical connectivity. However, most studies manipulate one particular stimulus in what are necessarily very controlled and restricted environments. Further, it is not known if the differences in the dynamic nature of a given environment (restricted or highly variable) are responsible for brain/behavior alterations early in development, or if a highly dynamic environment can increase the capacity for further change in adult behavior. In the current proposal, we take advantage of a unique resource at UC Davis – field pens located on our Riparian Reserve that are 3,000 times the size of a standard laboratory cage. These field pens provide a highly enriched and dynamic semi-natural environment in which to rear rats. We will quantify tactile natural scene statistics between the semi-natural and laboratory environments, allowing us to quantify differences between the two rearing stimulus conditions, and to subsequently test each group of animals with the full set of stimuli that both groups experienced during development. A number of features of brain organization, gene expression, and behavior will be compared between laboratory rats and rats reared in these semi-natural, highly enriched conditions. While this semi-natural rearing may affect numerous genes, behaviors, and brain regions, we focus on genes associated with cortical development, areal boundary formation, and plasticity. We will sample developing animals to quantify changes in gene expression during critical periods, and relate this expression to adult performance from the same cohort (litttermates) on behaviors that require sensorimotor integration and coordination in adults. We will further quantify neural phenotypes of primary somatosensory cortex (S1), investigating somatotopy, receptive field shape, and cortico-cortical and cortico-thalamic connections. We believe this modality will be highly impacted because the large space available in the field pens will promote active tactile exploration for navigation and social interaction. This is the first study that investigates how early exposure to the rich array of natural stimuli and vastly increased movement options occurring in a natural environment impacts gene expression, neural phenotypes, and behavior.

项目摘要 新皮层是一种独特的哺乳动物特征，该特征具有深刻的行为灵活性。一部分 灵活性来自新皮层的能力，可以通过早期的感觉和运动体验来塑造 允许生物体将其感觉系统调整为环境的特定问题和机会 饲养它。这种发展可塑性使动物可以产生适应性行为 最好的是满足其一生对环境的可变需求。已经很早就确定了 感觉体验可以改变皮质场（皮质图）内的感觉或运动表示形式，中性 响应特性以及皮质和皮层连通性。但是，大多数研究都操纵一个 在必要的非常受控和受限环境中的特定刺激。此外，这是不知道的 如果给定环境的动态性质（受限或高度可变）的差异负责 大脑/行为在开发的早期改变，或者如果高度动态的环境可以增加容量 为了进一步改变成人行为。在当前的建议中，我们利用UC的独特资源 戴维斯（Davis） - 位于河岸储备上的野牛，是标准实验室笼子的3,000倍。 这些野外笔提供了高度富集的动态半自然环境，可以在其中捕获大鼠。我们将 量化半自然和实验室环境之间的触觉自然场景统计，使我们能够 量化两个饲养刺激条件之间的差异，然后测试每组 两组在发育过程中经历的全套刺激的动物。许多功能 将比较脑组织，基因表达和行为的实验室大鼠和饲养的大鼠之间 这些半自然，高度丰富的条件。虽然这种半自然饲养可能会影响许多基因，但 行为和大脑区域，我们专注于与皮质发育相关的基因，面积边界 形成和可塑性。我们将采样开发动物以量化基因表达的变化 关键时期，并将这种表达与来自同一队列的成人表现相关联 需要感觉运动集成和成人协调的行为。我们将进一步量化中性 原发性体感皮质（S1）的表型，调查的体体性皮质，接受场形状和 皮质皮质和皮质 - 丘脑连接。我们认为这种方式将受到很大影响，因为 野外可用的大空间将促进导航和社交活动的主动触觉探索 相互作用。这是第一项研究的研究，该研究调查了如何尽早暴露于丰富的自然刺激和 在自然环境中发生大幅增加的运动选项会影响基因表达，中性 表型和行为。