@article{ref1,
title="Modular Deconstruction Reveals the Dynamical and Physical Building Blocks of a Locomotion Motor Program",
journal="Neuron",
year="2015",
author="Bruno, Angela M. and Frost, William N. and Humphries, Mark D.",
volume="86",
number="1",
pages="304-318",
abstract="The neural substrates of motor programs are only well understood for small, dedicated circuits. Here we investigate how a motor program is constructed within a large network. We imaged populations of neurons in the Aplysia pedal ganglion during execution of a locomotion motor program. We found that the program was built from a very small number of dynamical building blocks, including both neural ensembles and low-dimensional rotational dynamics. These map onto physically discrete regions of the ganglion, so that the motor program has a corresponding modular organization in both dynamical and physical space. Using this dynamic map, we identify the population potentially implementing the rhythmic pattern generator and find that its activity physically traces a looped trajectory, recapitulating its low-dimensional rotational dynamics. Our results suggest that, even in simple invertebrates, neural motor programs are implemented by large, distributed networks containing multiple dynamical systems.<p /><p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="0896-6273",
doi="10.1016/j.neuron.2015.03.005",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2015.03.005"
}