Journal
BRAIN RESEARCH REVIEWS
Volume 57, Issue 1, Pages 64-76Publisher
ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV
DOI: 10.1016/j.brainresrev.2007.06.025
Keywords
post-inhibitory rebound; locomotion; conditional bursting; central pattern generator; electrotonic coupling
Categories
Funding
- CIHR [79413] Funding Source: Medline
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Despite significant advances in our understanding of pattern generation in invertebrates and lower vertebrates, there have been barriers to the application of the principles learned to the definition of networks underlying mammalian locomotion. Major difficulties have arisen in identifying spinal interneurones in preparations which allow study of neuronal intrinsic properties and the role of identified interneurones in locomotor networks. Recent genetic technologies in which selective expression of fluorescent proteins in specific populations of mouse spinal neurones have provided new avenues of investigation. In this review, we focus on the generation of locomotor rhythm and outline criteria that rhythm-generating neurones might be expected to fulfill. We then examine the extent to which a recently identified population of spinal interneurones, Hb9 interneurones, fulfill these criteria. Finally, we suggest that Hb9 interneurones could be involved in an asymmetric model of locomotor rhythmogenesis through projections of electrotonically coupled rhythm-generating modules to flexor pattern formation half-centres. The principles learned from studying this population of interneurones have led to strategies to systematically evaluate neurones that may be involved in locomotor rhythmogenesis. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available