The neck motor system of the flyCalliphora erythrocephala

Milde, J. J.; Seyan, H. S.; Strausfeld, Nicholas J.

doi:10.1007/bf00609728

Cited by 202 publications

(58 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…For convenience we refer to those NMNs that respond to visual stimuli with action potentials as exhibiting "type I behavior" ["visual" NMNs in the terminology of Milde et al (1987)] and those that do not as exhibiting "type II behavior" ["nonvisual" NMNs in the terminology of Milde et al (1987)]. This terminology is not meant to imply that there are two distinct classes of NMN but instead is used for convenience to distinguish between NMN responses based upon just one particular criterion: the action potential response to visual stimuli.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Occasionally the NMN would fire a burst of action potentials (supplemental Fig. 1, available at www.jneurosci.org as supplemental material); these bursts were correlated with haltere beating and contraction of the leg muscles and have been described previously (Sandeman and Markl, 1980;Milde et al, 1987). Any data taken during these bursts were discarded and the experimental trial was repeated.…”

Section: Electrophysiologymentioning

confidence: 91%

“…To answer this question we recorded from NMNs that integrate both visual LPTC and haltere inputs (Sandeman and Markl, 1980;Strausfeld and Seyan, 1985;Milde et al, 1987;Huston and Krapp, 2008) to control compensatory head movements (Hengstenberg, 1991). We found that, in some NMNs, visual stimuli will only produce action potentials in the presence of a simultaneous haltere input.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Nonlinear Integration of Visual and Haltere Inputs in Fly Neck Motor Neurons

Huston¹,

Krapp²

2009

J. Neurosci.

101

114

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Animals use information from multiple sensory organs to generate appropriate behavior. Exactly how these different sensory inputs are fused at the motor system is not well understood. Here we study how fly neck motor neurons integrate information from two well characterized sensory systems: visual information from the compound eye and gyroscopic information from the mechanosensory halteres. Extracellular recordings reveal that a subpopulation of neck motor neurons display "gating-like" behavior: they do not fire action potentials in response to visual stimuli alone but will do so if the halteres are coactivated. Intracellular recordings show that these motor neurons receive small, sustained subthreshold visual inputs in addition to larger inputs that are phase locked to haltere movements. Our results suggest that the nonlinear gating-like effect results from summation of these two inputs with the action potential threshold providing the nonlinearity. As a result of this summation, the sustained visual depolarization is transformed into a temporally structured train of action potentials synchronized to the haltere beating movements. This simple mechanism efficiently fuses two different sensory signals and may also explain the context-dependent effects of visual inputs on fly behavior.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Electrophysiologymentioning

confidence: 91%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Nonlinear Integration of Visual and Haltere Inputs in Fly Neck Motor Neurons

Huston¹,

Krapp²

2009

J. Neurosci.

101

114

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“…Head movements are effected by 21 pairs of neck muscles, with a single motor neuron innervating each muscle. [12][13][14] In the blowfly Calliphora, the range of head turns is ± 20° both horizontally (yaw) and vertically (pitch), and ± 90° for rotations about the line of sight (roll) which roughly corresponds with the main body axis. Here, head movements are interpreted exclusively as eye movements but, of course, they also affect other head sense organs and may serve other purposes, for example as one component of flight steering.…”

Section: The Fly's Eyes and Gaze Move Mentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…studied fly families [12][13][14][32][33][34][35][36]48,52 and in a few other insects, particularly locusts 11,[37][38][39] This paragraph summarizes briefly what is known about the two motion sensitive systems of the fly-the halteres and the visual system.…”

Section: Head/trunk Coordinationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gaze control in the blowfly Calliphora: a multisensory, two-stage integration process

Hengstenberg

1991

Seminars in Neuroscience

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Position-specific central projections of mechanosensory neurons on the haltere of the blow fly,Calliphora vicina

Chan

Dickinson

1996

J. Comp. Neurol.

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The halteres of Dipteran insects play an important role in flight control. They are complex mechanosensory devices equipped with approximately 400 campaniform sensilla, cuticular strain gauges, which are organized into five fields at the base of each haltere. Despite the important role of these mechanosensory structures in flight, the central organization of the sensory afferents originating from the different field campaniforms has not been determined. We show here that in the blow fly, Calliphora vicina, sensory afferents from the campaniform fields project to the thorax in a region-specific manner. Afferents from different fields have different projection profiles and in addition, the projection pattern of afferents from different regions of the same field may show further variation. However, central target regions of these afferents are not exclusive to particular sensory fields because cells from different fields can possess similar projection profiles. Convergence of afferent projections is not limited to axons from the haltere fields, but is also observed between afferents originating from the haltere fields and those from serially homologous fields on the radial vein of the wing. Although we have not determined the specific cellular targets of the haltere sensory cells, the afferents of a dorsal field could make potential contact with at least one identified wing steering motoneuron that is known to be important in turning maneuvers. Our results, thus, provide the anatomical basis for studying how mechanosensory information encoded by the complex fields on the base of the haltere is mapped onto different functional regions within the CNS.

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The neck motor system of the flyCalliphora erythrocephala

Cited by 202 publications

References 25 publications

Nonlinear Integration of Visual and Haltere Inputs in Fly Neck Motor Neurons

Nonlinear Integration of Visual and Haltere Inputs in Fly Neck Motor Neurons

Gaze control in the blowfly Calliphora: a multisensory, two-stage integration process

Position-specific central projections of mechanosensory neurons on the haltere of the blow fly,Calliphora vicina

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