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The Journal of Neuroscience, May 15, 1998, 18(10):3831-3842
Intersegmental Coordination of Limb Movements during Locomotion:
Mathematical Models Predict Circuits That Drive Swimmeret Beating
Frances K.
Skinner1 and
Brian
Mulloney2
1 Playfair Neuroscience Unit, The Toronto Hospital
Research Institute, and Institute of Biomedical Engineering, University
of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5T 2S8, Canada, and 2 Section
of Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior, University of California,
Davis, CA 95616-8755
Normal locomotion in arthropods and vertebrates is a complex
behavior, and the neural mechanisms that coordinate their limbs during
locomotion at different speeds are unknown. The neural modules that
drive cyclic movements of swimmerets respond to changes in excitation
by changing the period of the motor pattern. As period changes,
however, both intersegmental phase differences and the relative
durations of bursts of impulses in different sets of motor neurons are
preserved. To investigate these phenomena, we constructed a cellular
model of the local pattern-generating circuit that drives each
swimmeret. We then constructed alternative intersegmental circuits that
might coordinate these local circuits. The structures of both the model
of the local circuit and the alternative models of the coordinating
circuit were based on and constrained by previous experimental results
on pattern-generating neurons and coordinating interneurons.
To evaluate the relative merits of these alternatives, we compared
their dynamics with the performance of the real circuit when the level
of excitation was changed. Many of the alternative coordinating
circuits failed. One coordinating circuit, however, did effectively
match the performance of the real system as period changed from 1 to
3.2 Hz. With this coordinating circuit, both the intersegmental phase
differences and the relative durations of activity within each of the
local modules fell within the ranges characteristic of the normal motor
pattern and did not change significantly as period changed. These
results predict a mechanism of coordination and a pattern of
intersegmental connections in the CNS that is amenable to experimental
test.
Key words:
pattern generation; coordination; interneuron; constant
phase; excitation; mathematical model; frequency changes
Copyright © 1998 Society for Neuroscience 0270-6474/98/18103831-12$05.00/0
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