scholarly journals Behavioral evidence for nested central pattern generator control of Drosophila grooming

eLife ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Primoz Ravbar ◽  
Neil Zhang ◽  
Julie H Simpson

Central pattern generators (CPGs) are neurons or neural circuits that produce periodic output without requiring patterned input. More complex behaviors can be assembled from simpler subroutines, and nested CPGs have been proposed to coordinate their repetitive elements, organizing control over different time scales. Here, we use behavioral experiments to establish that Drosophila grooming may be controlled by nested CPGs. On a short time scale (5–7 Hz, ~ 200 ms/movement), flies clean with periodic leg sweeps and rubs. More surprisingly, transitions between bouts of head sweeping and leg rubbing are also periodic on a longer time scale (0.3–0.6 Hz, ~2 s/bout). We examine grooming at a range of temperatures to show that the frequencies of both oscillations increase—a hallmark of CPG control—and also that rhythms at the two time scales increase at the same rate, indicating that the nested CPGs may be linked. This relationship holds when sensory drive is held constant using optogenetic activation, but oscillations can decouple in spontaneously grooming flies, showing that alternative control modes are possible. Loss of sensory feedback does not disrupt periodicity but slow down the longer time scale alternation. Nested CPGs simplify the generation of complex but repetitive behaviors, and identifying them in Drosophila grooming presents an opportunity to map the neural circuits that constitute them.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Primoz Ravbar ◽  
Neil Zhang ◽  
Julie H. Simpson

AbstractCentral pattern generators (CPGs) are neurons or neural circuits that produce periodic output without requiring patterned input. More complex behaviors can be assembled from simpler subroutines, and nested CPGs have been proposed to coordinate their repetitive elements, simplifying control over different time-scales. Here, we use behavioral experiments to establish that Drosophila grooming may be controlled by nested CPGs. On the short time-scale (5-7 Hz), flies execute periodic leg sweeps and rubs. More surprisingly, transitions between bouts of head cleaning and leg rubbing are also periodic on a longer time-scale (0.3 - 0.6 Hz). We examine grooming at a range of temperatures to show that the frequencies of both oscillations increase – a hallmark of CPG control – and also that the two time-scales increase at the same rate, indicating that the nested CPGs may be linked. This relationship also holds when sensory drive is held constant using optogenetic activation, but the rhythms decouple in spontaneously grooming flies, showing that alternative control modes are possible. Nested CPGs simplify generation of complex but repetitive behaviors, and identifying them in Drosophila grooming presents an opportunity to map the neural circuits that constitute them.


1971 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
pp. 144-159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Warner

The inception of the present era of interest in rapidly varying stars may be identified with M. F. WALKER’s discovery in 1954 (WALKER 1954) of changes in the brightness of the blue object MacRae+43° 1 (now known as MVLyr), on a time scale of a few minutes. Outside of flare stars, few other stellar objects were suspected to vary on such a short time scale. GREENSTEIN’s (1954) spectra showed that MV Lyr resembles an old nova, which stimulated WALKER to look for light fluctuations in old, recurrent, and dwarf novae and related stars. His observational evidence that all members of these classes show variations of various amplitudes and time scales is summarized in the IAU Colloquium on non-stable stars (WALKER 1957). Most spectacular of his discoveries was the existence of 71 sec periodic variations in the light from the remnant of Nova Herculis 1934 (DQ Her) (WALKER 1956).


2019 ◽  
Vol 76 (5) ◽  
pp. 1265-1287 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arjun Jagannathan ◽  
Kraig Winters ◽  
Laurence Armi

Abstract Uniformly stratified flows approaching long and dynamically tall ridges develop two distinct flow components over disparate time scales. The fluid upstream and below a “blocking level” is stagnant in the limit of an infinite ridge and flows around the sides when the ridge extent is finite. The streamwise half-width of the obstacle at the blocking level arises as a natural inner length scale for the flow, while the excursion time over this half-width is an associated short time scale for the streamwise flow evolution. Over a longer time scale, low-level horizontal flow splitting leads to the establishment of an upstream layerwise potential flow beneath the blocking level. We demonstrate through numerical experiments that for sufficiently long ridges, crest control and streamwise asymmetry are seen on both the short and long time scales. On the short time scale, upstream blocking is established quickly and the flow is well described as a purely infinite-ridge overflow. Over the long time scale associated with flow splitting, low-level flow escapes around the sides, but the overflow continues to be hydraulically controlled and streamwise asymmetric in the neighborhood of the crest. We quantify this late-time overflow by estimating its volumetric transport and then briefly demonstrate how this approach can be extended to predict the overflow across nonuniform ridge shapes.


1989 ◽  
Vol 134 ◽  
pp. 106-107
Author(s):  
J. H. Beall ◽  
W. A. Snyder ◽  
K. S. Wood

The Einstein IPC observed the bright (5 mCrab) X-ray emitting BL Lac Object PKS 2155-304 on 1979 November 4th and 5th through 7th and on 1980 May 16th through 18th. A total of 17.4 hours were spent monitoring the source. Changes in intensity of between 10–50% are evident in the data for time scales of days and months. The source was constant to within 10% of the mean intensity on hourly time scales for all intervals of data except one. Repeated factor of 2 variations in intensity, occuring on 10–30 second time scales, were observed during the first 50 minutes of the 1979 Nov. 5th observation. These variations, however, were anticorrelated with variations seen in an adjacent background region. Concurrent MPC observations also failed to confirm the rapid changes, although they should have been readily detected. Thus, we conclude that the observed rapid variations are not intrinsic to the source, but originated in the IPC. These results can have implications for other IPC reports of short time scale variability for active galaxies and for source models based on such observations.


1996 ◽  
Vol 118 (3) ◽  
pp. 781-786 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. C. Hipwell ◽  
C.-L. Tien

This work applies fractal percolation theory to examine the impact of anomalous diffusion in short time-scale applications of random media. It is shown that there exist three regimes of heat transport corresponding to transport over the basic percolation unit (particle), the fractal cluster, and the homogeneous medium. Scaling is performed to determine the characteristic time scales of anomalous diffusion. The dependence of these time scales on both material properties and structure is examined to assess the impact of the anomalous diffusion regime on short time-scale energy transport. Additional criteria that determine the importance of anomalous diffusion relative to other transport phenomena and properties, such as radiation and thermal boundary resistance, are established.


1993 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 196-201
Author(s):  
Søren Achim Nielsen ◽  
Thomas Hougaard

An alternative test is presented, in which algal cultures are used for testing toxic substances. This test system is based on variations in the size distribution of cells in test cultures as a measurement of growth. Thus, inhibition of mitotic activity is used as a measurement for toxic effects. The test can be performed on a short time-scale and is very sensitive to even weak toxic doses.


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