Date : 27/03/2013

Laboratory
Laboratory of Physiology of Perception and Action
UMR 7152, CNRS, Collège de France
11 place Marcelin Berthelot
75005 Paris
Website
Main discipline : Neurophysiology
Lab director : Mr Sidney Wiener

PhD Supervisor
Mr Sidney Wiener
email : Cet e-mail est protégé contre les robots collecteurs de mails, votre navigateur doit accepter le Javascript pour le voir
phone: +33 1 44 27 16 21

Subjects
1.: Dynamics of interactions within brain circuits
2.: Neural basis of cognitive functions (decision, spatial navigation, set-shifting)
3.: Interfacing neurophysiology and neural network modelling for robotics

Tools and Methodologies
1.: recordings of ensembles of neurons in multiple structures in behaving rats
2.: analyses of temporal coding of spike and local field potential activity

Summary of lab's interests
The Laboratory of Physiology of Perception and action is a multi-disciplinary group of teams whose common goal is better to better understand the neural bases of perception and action, as well as other cognitive functions like attention and emory. Methodologies employed are varied and each question is addressed with theoretical and experimental approaches. One of the original points of the laboratory is to study these various functions on various levels, from neuron to behavior, in animal models and in man. We also collaborate with hospitals in order to study these functions in patients and to help contribute to the development of methods for diagnostics and rehabilitation. Lastly, we work with industrial partners for discovery exchanges of information and techniques. The laboratory is co-sponsored by the CNRS and the College of France. It receives support from many national (e.g. ANR) and international co-operations (e.g. EC) as well as industrial partners.

Summary of project
While many brain systems have been characterized for their involvement in spatial navigation (hippocampus), cue-guided goal-directed activity (dorsolateral striatum) and set-shifting (prefrontal cortex), the neural mechanisms underlying shifts between behavioral strategies remain unknown. The objective here is to characterize the neural processing in the Hippocampal-Prefrontal cortex-Striatal system in rats shifting between strategies requiring functionally complementary networks. Rats are implanted with multi-channel electrode arrays (tetrodes or silicon probes) and recordings are made during task acquisition then as the rats shift between tasks.

Interdisciplinarity of the project
This work involves neuroanatomy (for selecting areas for electrode placement and histological control of recording sites), multichannel neurophysiology, behavioral psychology, use of electronic interfaces, analyses including behavior, statistics, ensemble activity detection analyses (including developing new ones), behavioral correlates of single neuron, neuron ensembles, local field potentials and their interactions, histological analyses, cognitive science. The results are then transmitted to robotics teams interested in applying knowledge about brain mechanisms for cognitive functions for inspiring control architectures for autonomous mobile robots.

Do you have an available funding for this project ?
ANR