Evidence and control of bifurcations in a respiratory system

The comprehension of motor activities that give rise to complex behavior are of great interest. A widely used animal model to study them is the one of singing birds, where respiration plays a fundamental role. Different mechanisms have been proposed to account for the dynamical origin of these motor gestures. In this work, we study the temporal signals of the pressure gestures used by domestic canaries (Serinus canaria) to perform their songs. Their analysis revealed that ubiquitous occurring transitions between syllables can be interpreted as the bifurcations of a low dimensional dynamical system. This provides evidence supporting a model where different nonlinearly interacting timescales participate.Fil: Goldin, Matías Alejandro. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Ciudad Universitaria. Instituto de Física de Buenos Aires. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Instituto de Física de Buenos Aires; ArgentinaFil: Mindlin, Bernardo Gabriel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Ciudad Universitaria. Instituto de Física de Buenos Aires. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Instituto de Física de Buenos Aires; Argentin

MemoMarote: a working memory training game

Mate Marote is a flexible framework for large-scale educational interventions that include games developed, based on aspects from cognitive sciences as an effective way of learning. MemoMarote is a computer game designed for training working memory. The pilot study of this platform was an intervention in La Rioja province (Argentina). In this article we analyze the registered statistics of use of the unsupervised version of the game. We found that playing activity had a peak when recently installed, decreasing during the first year and observing an increase when starting school classes in 2013. Analyzing the usage statistics we observed that players have a poor performance, with more incorrect answers than correct ones. These results suggest that children did not read instructions or they were not understood, and so they played the game incorrectly. We plan the creation of an interactive tutorial to increase the understanding of the game.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

MemoMarote: a working memory training game

Mate Marote is a flexible framework for large-scale educational interventions that include games developed, based on aspects from cognitive sciences as an effective way of learning. MemoMarote is a computer game designed for training working memory. The pilot study of this platform was an intervention in La Rioja province (Argentina). In this article we analyze the registered statistics of use of the unsupervised version of the game. We found that playing activity had a peak when recently installed, decreasing during the first year and observing an increase when starting school classes in 2013. Analyzing the usage statistics we observed that players have a poor performance, with more incorrect answers than correct ones. These results suggest that children did not read instructions or they were not understood, and so they played the game incorrectly. We plan the creation of an interactive tutorial to increase the understanding of the game.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

MemoMarote: a working memory training game

Mate Marote is a flexible framework for large-scale educational interventions that include games developed, based on aspects from cognitive sciences as an effective way of learning. MemoMarote is a computer game designed for training working memory. The pilot study of this platform was an intervention in La Rioja province (Argentina). In this article we analyze the registered statistics of use of the unsupervised version of the game. We found that playing activity had a peak when recently installed, decreasing during the first year and observing an increase when starting school classes in 2013. Analyzing the usage statistics we observed that players have a poor performance, with more incorrect answers than correct ones. These results suggest that children did not read instructions or they were not understood, and so they played the game incorrectly. We plan the creation of an interactive tutorial to increase the understanding of the game.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

Up-scaling Mate Marote: a university-industry interaction experience

The new digital era opens up great possiblilities in education. Mate Marote is a platform including activities and educational games for massive scale interventions. Recent creation of Fundación Sadosky, has favored the collaboration between industry and academia in projects involving novel methods and ideas with big scale software platforms which require experience in architecture and high-end software development. The collaboration established showed exceptional conditions for the mutual benefit: the incorporation of academic research in educational neuroscience in the industry and the transference of well-established methodology and software development experience in the academic environment.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativa (SADIO

Up-scaling Mate Marote: a university-industry interaction experience

The new digital era opens up great possiblilities in education. Mate Marote is a platform including activities and educational games for massive scale interventions. Recent creation of Fundación Sadosky, has favored the collaboration between industry and academia in projects involving novel methods and ideas with big scale software platforms which require experience in architecture and high-end software development. The collaboration established showed exceptional conditions for the mutual benefit: the incorporation of academic research in educational neuroscience in the industry and the transference of well-established methodology and software development experience in the academic environment.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativa (SADIO

Far transfer to language and math of a short software-based gaming intervention

Executive functions (EF) in children can be trained, but it remains unknown whether training-related benefits elicit far transfer to real-life situations. Here, we investigate whether a set of computerized games might yield near and far transfer on an experimental and an active control group of low-SES otherwise typically developing 6-y-olds in a 3-mo pretest–training–posttest design that was ecologically deployed (at school). The intervention elicits transfer to some (but not all) facets of executive function. These changes cascade to real-world measures of school performance. The intervention equalizes academic outcomes across children who regularly attend school and those who do not because of social and familiar circumstances.Fil: Goldin, Andrea Paula. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Física. Laboratorio de Neurociencia Integrativa; Argentina. Universidad Torcuato Di Tella; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Hermida, Maria Julia. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. CEMIC-CONICET. Centro de Educaciones Médicas e Investigaciones Clínicas "Norberto Quirno". CEMIC-CONICET.; ArgentinaFil: Shalóm, Diego Edgar. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Física. Laboratorio de Neurociencia Integrativa; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Costa, Martín Elias. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Física. Laboratorio de Neurociencia Integrativa; ArgentinaFil: Lopez Rosenfeld, Matías. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Física. Laboratorio de Neurociencia Integrativa; ArgentinaFil: Segretin, María Soledad. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. CEMIC-CONICET. Centro de Educaciones Médicas e Investigaciones Clínicas "Norberto Quirno". CEMIC-CONICET.; ArgentinaFil: Fernandez Slezak, Diego. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Computación; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Lipina, Sebastián Javier. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. CEMIC-CONICET. Centro de Educaciones Médicas e Investigaciones Clínicas "Norberto Quirno". CEMIC-CONICET.; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de San Martín; ArgentinaFil: Sigman, Mariano. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Departamento de Física. Laboratorio de Neurociencia Integrativa; Argentina. Universidad Torcuato Di Tella; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentin

Up-scaling Mate Marote: a university-industry interaction experience

The new digital era opens up great possiblilities in education. Mate Marote is a platform including activities and educational games for massive scale interventions. Recent creation of Fundación Sadosky, has favored the collaboration between industry and academia in projects involving novel methods and ideas with big scale software platforms which require experience in architecture and high-end software development. The collaboration established showed exceptional conditions for the mutual benefit: the incorporation of academic research in educational neuroscience in the industry and the transference of well-established methodology and software development experience in the academic environment.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativa (SADIO

Cooling telencephalic nuclei to test the interplay between timescales in a birdsong model

En este trabajo estudiamos los mecanismos neuronales en el cerebro de las aves involucrados en la generación de los gestos motores del canto. Exploramos este sistema utilizando herramientas de análisis experimentales, teóricas y computacionales. La naturaleza del control telencefálico sobre los circuitos premotores y motores se encuentra en debate. Las hipótesis de funcionamiento van desde la usurpación completa de circuitos a los que conecta “río abajo” (downstream en inglés) a mecanismos interactivos de control. En este trabajo, mostramos teórica y experimentalmente, que el control motor telencefálico del canto en canarios (Serinus canaria) es consistente con una estrategia interactiva. Utilizamos predicciones de un modelo teórico de control respiratorio, para mostrar que el enfriamiento leve de un núcleo del telencéfalo (HVC) conlleva al estiramiento en el canto, pero que un enfriamiento adicional causa la reestructuración progresiva del mismo. Esto es consistente con la hipótesis de que los gestos respiratorios son respuestas subarmónicas a una escala de tiempo presente a la salida de HVC. Construimos un dispositivo enfriador que nos permitió realizar un enfriamiento controlado, local y bilateral de la zona del cerebro donde se encuentra el HVC. Logramos medir simultáneamente el canto y la presión dentro de los sacos aéreos, para diferentes temperaturas de enfriamiento de este núcleo bilateral. Como resultado obtuvimos estiramientos y luego rompimientos de las estructuras silábicas del canto, lo cual sugiere la existencia de al menos una escala temporal adicional en la ruta motora, que interactúa con la que se halla en HVC. Encontramos también evidencia en los patrones de presión de canarios de la existencia de bifurcaciones que ocurren naturalmente entre transiciones de distintos tipos de sílabas. Estas pudieron ser interpretadas como modificaciones suaves de dos parámetros que describen la actividad de HVC en nuestro modelo interactivo, y una de ellas pudo ser manipulada con enfriamiento. La interacción entre una función motora vital, como la respiración, y el control motor del telencéfalo sobre el canto sugiere la existencia de mecanismos más generales de cómo la integración no lineal de estructuras cerebrales evolutivamente nuevas con los circuitos preexistentes dan lugar a comportamientos nuevos y diversos. Estos resultados ayudan a construir confianza en un punto de vista que considera la actividad motora generada por el sistema del canto como el resultado de al menos dos escalas de tiempo no lineales interactuando, y sugieren que la diversidad puede surgir de cambios suaves en instrucciones muy sencillas.In this work we study the neuronal mechanisms in the brain of birds involved in the generation of the motor gestures responsible for singing. We explore this system with experimental, theoretical and computational analytical tools. The nature of telencephalic control over premotor and motor circuits is debated. Hypotheses range from complete usurping of downstream circuitry to highly interactive mechanisms of control. We show theoretically and experimentally, that telencephalic song motor control in canaries is consistent with a highly interactive strategy. Using predictions from a theoretical model of respiratory control, we show that mild cooling of a forebrain nucleus (HVC) led to song stretching, but further cooling caused progressive restructuring of song, consistent with the hypothesis that respiratory gestures are subharmonic responses to a timescale present in the output of HVC. We built a cooling device that allowed us to perform a controlled and local temperature decrease of the bilateral zone of the brain where HVC is. We measured simultaneously the song and the intra air sac pressure for different cooling temperatures of this bilateral nucleus. This allowed us to find stretching and then breaking of the syllabic structure of song, which suggests the existence of at least an additional timescale in the motor pathway, interacting with the one present in HVC. We also found evidence of naturally occurring bifurcations in the transitions between different type of syllables of the pressure patterns of canary song. These could be interpreted as smooth modifications of two parameters that describe the activity of HVC in our interactive model, and one of them could be manipulated by means of cooling. This interaction between a life-sustaining motor function (respiration) and telencephalic song motor control suggests a more general mechanism of how nonlinear integration of evolutionarily new brain structures into existing circuitry gives rise to diverse, new behavior. These results allow to build confidence on a view that considers the motor activity generated by the song system as the result of at least two nonlinearly interacting timescales, and suggests that diversity may arise from slight changes of very simple instructions.Fil:Goldin, Matías Alejandro. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales; Argentina

Temperature manipulation of neuronal dynamics in a forebrain motor control nucleus

Different neuronal types within brain motor areas contribute to the generation of complex motor behaviors. A widely studied songbird forebrain nucleus (HVC) has been recognized as fundamental in shaping the precise timing characteristics of birdsong. This is based, among other evidence, on the stretching and the "breaking" of song structure when HVC is cooled. However, little is known about the temperature effects that take place in its neurons. To address this, we investigated the dynamics of HVC both experimentally and computationally. We developed a technique where simultaneous electrophysiological recordings were performed during temperature manipulation of HVC. We recorded spontaneous activity and found three effects: widening of the spike shape, decrease of the firing rate and change in the interspike interval distribution. All these effects could be explained with a detailed conductance based model of all the neurons present in HVC. Temperature dependence of the ionic channel time constants explained the first effect, while the second was based in the changes of the maximal conductance using single synaptic excitatory inputs. The last phenomenon, only emerged after introducing a more realistic synaptic input to the inhibitory interneurons. Two timescales were present in the interspike distributions. The behavior of one timescale was reproduced with different input balances received form the excitatory neurons, whereas the other, which disappears with cooling, could not be found assuming poissonian synaptic inputs. Furthermore, the computational model shows that the bursting of the excitatory neurons arises naturally at normal brain temperature and that they have an intrinsic delay at low temperatures. The same effect occurs at single synapses, which may explain song stretching. These findings shed light on the temperature dependence of neuronal dynamics and present a comprehensive framework to study neuronal connectivity. This study, which is based on intrinsic neuronal characteristics, may help to understand emergent behavioral changes.Fil: Goldin, Matías Alejandro. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Ciudad Universitaria. Instituto de Física de Buenos Aires. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Instituto de Física de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique; FranciaFil: Mindlin, Bernardo Gabriel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Ciudad Universitaria. Instituto de Física de Buenos Aires. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Instituto de Física de Buenos Aires; Argentin