Neural Mechanisms of Animal Behavior  205-1-2531

Semester	Workshop	Laboratory	Exercise	Frontal	# Credits
A	-	-	-	2	2

Preliminaries:

    205-1-1101

Syllabus:

This course focuses on the neuronal mechanisms used by animals to cope with a complex, variable, unpredictable and hostile environment. The following topics will be covered:

        Principles in Animal Behavior:
                 The mechanistic approach.
                 Types of Behaviors- reflexes, fixed action patterns, complex behaviors.
                 Animal communication.
                 Imprinting.
                 Nature and Nurture as determinants of animal behavior.

      Principles in Neurobiology:
                 The structure of neuronal cells.
                 The resting, action and synaptic potentials

       Sensory Worlds
                 Ultra-violet vision in bees
                 Echolocation: prey localization of prey in insects and bats
                 Object recognition
                 Navigation in ants and birds

       Decision Making
                 Command cells in simple animals
                 Command systems in vertebrates
                 Motivational states and their contribution to the process of decision making

      Biological rhythms
                 Central pattern generators
                 Network and pacemaker-generated rhythms
                 The circadian rhythm
     
       Central and Peripheral Feedback
                 Keeping a fixed image in motion: the optometric response in the fly
                 Error signals
                 The proprioceptive feedback

      Learning and Memory
                 The importance of the hippocampus in spatial learning
                 Cellular mechanisms of learning and memory

Teachers:

      Dr.     Yair Manor  (Course Director)
      Prof. Fred Libersat