神经科学家利用蝙蝠寻求解开大脑三维空间导航的秘密  

Neuroscientists are questing to unlock the secrets of three-dimensional navigation in the brains of bats

作　　者：付子英[1] 唐佳[1] 陈其才[1] Ziying Fu;Jia Tang;Qicai Chen(Hubei Key Laboratory of Genetic Regulation and Integrative Biology,School of Life Sciences,Central China Normal University,Wuhan 430079,China)

机构地区：[1]华中师范大学生命科学学院,遗传调控与整合生物学湖北省重点实验室,武汉430079

出　　处：《科学通报》2020年第8期656-664,共9页Chinese Science Bulletin

基　　金：国家自然科学基金(31200832,31772454);中央高校基本科研业务费专项(CCNU19GF007)资助。

摘　　要：揭开人和动物大脑方位感知与空间导航的秘密,一直是一个令人着迷的问题.科学家通过对大鼠和蝙蝠等动物近50年的研究,使我们对大脑二维(2 dimension, 2D)导航的神经基础有了较清楚的认识.研究发现,在海马和内嗅皮质等脑区有专门的导航细胞,包括位置细胞、网格细胞、边界细胞、头朝向细胞等.这些细胞及它们的"细胞域"可为2D空间导航提供"空间认知地图"或"心灵环境地图"和"指南针".然而,人和大量动物都生活在三维(3 dimension, 3D)空间中,大脑如何完成3D空间环境下的定位和导航?近年来,通过对爬行和飞行状态蝙蝠的研究,发现参与2D导航的那些细胞在3D空间下反应特性和模式均发生明显变化;蝙蝠属于社会性和群居性动物,研究还发现在其海马内存在社交位置细胞和目标方向角调谐细胞,分别负责获取环境中其他蝙蝠位置的踪迹信息以及目标的方向信息.由此可见,脑内这些空间定位细胞构成了导航的神经基础,并经过复杂的功能整合,构成了一个位于脑内的"微型全球定位系统",且在细胞水平上阐释了这种高级认知功能的原理.本文简要介绍了Nachum Ulanovsky等人近些年对蝙蝠大脑3D导航的研究.Unlocking the secrets of spatial orientation and navigation in the brains of humans and animals is a fascinating challenge question. Over the past 50 years, studying the brains of rats, bats, and other animals have provided insights into the neural basis of two dimensional(2 D) navigation. Cells exist in the brain that direct navigation, including place, grid, border and head-direction cells. The fields of these cells provide cognitive maps(i.e., a unified representation of the spatial environment) and compass, which regulate 2 D navigation. Place cells are hippocampal neurons that are activated when an animal traverses a specific location in the environment and the distance between different places is thought to be identified by grid cells in the medial entorhinal cortex. Distinct borders in the environment are encoded by border cells which are found in the medial entorhinal cortex and subiculum. The place, grid and border cells function as a navigational map. Head direction cells have been found in multiple brain regions and become active when the animal’s head points to a specific direction. The combination of all these cells is thought to be a neural compass for navigation. However, humans and animals basically live in a three-dimensional(3 D) spatial environment, so how does the brain navigate in 3 D? Recently,surprising findings were obtained by studying free moving or flying bats. Response properties of cells taking part in 2 D navigation could generate obviously changes under 3 D conditions. Place cells in a 3 D environment were active in confined3 D volumes, and all three axes of the 3 D environment were encoded with similar resolutions. Head direction cells in 3 D environment were tuned to azimuth, pitch or roll, or to conjunctive combinations of these 3 D angles, and the 3 D head direction cells were represented in azimuth × pitch toroidal coordinates. A new navigational cell type, called social place cell, has been found in the bat hippocampus, and these cells are responsible for obtaining place in

关 键 词：三维导航 位置细胞 网格细胞 头方位细胞 边界细胞 蝙蝠 

分 类 号：R338[医药卫生—人体生理学]