Project Details
Projekt
Developmental noise aids robust motor pattern generation and behavior
Applicants
Professor Dr. Carsten Duch; Dr. Stefanie Ryglewski
Subject Area
Developmental Neurobiology
Molecular Biology and Physiology of Neurons and Glial Cells
Molecular Biology and Physiology of Neurons and Glial Cells
Term
since 2022
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 453877723
With over a million species, insects show remarkable evolutionary success. This success is in part based on access to unutilized niches and rapid translocation, and thus small body size and the ability to fly. However, in small flyers aerodynamic constraints require high wingbeat frequencies, and space constraints demand miniaturization of the central nervous controllers for flight. In roughly 600,000 flying insect species, these requirements are met by highly specialized asynchronous flight muscles (a-IFMs) and exoskeletal specializations that combine to a wingbeat oscillator that generates wing beat frequencies of up to > 1,000 Hz (Dickinson, Lighton, 1995; Deora et al., 2017). The asynchronous flight muscles are specialized skeletal muscles, as they do not contract in synchrony with the spikes of the motoneurons (MNs) they are innervated by. By contrast, the MNs fire only every 20th to 40th wingbeat and control muscle contraction amplitude and frequency by slow adjustments of the myoplasmic calcium concentration (Gordon, Dickinson, 2006; Lehmann, Bartussek, 2017; Wang et al., 2011). In the last funding period, we have characterized architecture and function of the small central pattern generator (CPG) that is located in the ventral nerve cord (VNC) and controls MN firing patterns, and thus flight power output (Hürkey et al., 2023). In particular, we have identified prominent roles of developmental imprecisions for robust MN input/output computations and CPG architecture and function. Based on our findings, we now propose to further study the roles of variability in ion channel expression and properties as well as dendritic complexity for robust MN excitability and CPG output. Moreover, we will test precise and imprecise mechanisms for synaptic partner choice that ensure shallow input/output relations and equal input synapse proportions during the development of all flight MNs, two features that we have demonstrated to be essential for robust circuit function.
DFG Programme
Research Units
