spiketrain
 >>Passive electroreception

Home
 

The paddlefish, Polyodon spathula, is a filter feeding fish which main prey consists of small water fleas (e.g. daphnia). In the course of my investigations I studied the response properties of afferent fibers and dorsal octavolateral nucleus (DON) neurons to moving DC field of different polarity.

In addition I characterized the response properties of neurons in the lateral mesencephalic nucleus (LMN) to uniform fields, to moving artificial DC stimuli and to live daphnia and compare them to neurons in the DON. In a separate study I investigated the different receptive field properties of units in all known electroreceptive areas of the paddlefish brain and tried to relate them to specific motor behaviors such as prey catching or object avoidance.

paddfish

 

Paddlefish striking at an artificial dipole (picture courtesy of Lon Wilkens)

 
   

Back to the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior or back to the Bass lab