Upcoming Events!
Please note the location change to the Knight Campus Beetham Family Seminar Room and earlier pre-seminar reception start time of 3:30pm for this week's seminar.
From the sky bridge cross to Knight Campus and take either the stairs of elevator to the first floor (street level). The seminar room will be to the left, and the reception will be just outside of the room.
My lab aims to understand the molecular mechanisms underlying the sensations of itch, touch, and pain. Humans rely on these senses for a broad range of essential behaviors. For example, acute pain acts as a warning signal that alerts us to noxious mechanical, chemical, and thermal stimuli, which can potentially damage tissue. Likewise, itch sensations trigger reflexes that may protect us from disease-carrying insects. Despite these essential protective functions, itch and pain can outlast their usefulness and become chronic diseases. We use cellular physiology, molecular biology, molecular genetics, and behavioral studies to elucidate the mechanisms underlying itch and pain transduction under normal and pathophysiological conditions. This talk will highlight the interactions between the nervous system and immune system that promote chronic itch, pain and inflammation.
Please join us on Wednesday April 10th for a special seminar with Dr. Kelsey Anbuhl a postdoc at the Center for Neural Science at New York University. Kelsey is the selected Spotlight Seminar speaker based on community nominations and the event is supported by a UO Biology DEI grant. She will give a 50 min. research seminar at 3 pm in Willamette 110 on her work investigating the cognitive and perceptual consequences of adolescent hearing loss.
The talk will be targeted at a broad science audience!
At 4 pm in Onyx 275 we will also host a Q&A for trainees with Kelsey and she will talk about her career trajectory and how her own experience with hearing loss inspired her research. See flyer for additional details and we hope to see you there!
Abstract: Learned associations between stimuli in different sensory modalities can shape the way we perceive these stimuli (Mcgurk and Macdonald, 1976). During audio-visual associative learning, auditory cortex has been shown to underlie multi-modal plasticity in visual cortex (McIntosh et al., 1998; Zangenehpour and Zatorre, 2010). However, how processing in visual cortex is altered when an auditory stimulus signals a visual event and what the neural mechanisms are that mediate such experience-dependent audio-visual associations is not well understood. Here we describe a neural mechanism that contributes to shaping visual representations of behaviorally relevant stimuli through direct interactions between auditory and visual cortices. We show that auditory association with a visual stimulus leads to an experience-dependent suppression of visual responses in visual cortex. This suppression of the predictable visual stimulus response is driven in part by input from auditory cortex. By recording from auditory cortex axons in visual cortex, we find that these axons carry a mixture of auditory and retinotopically matched visual input. Moreover, optogenetic stimulation of auditory cortex axons in visual cortex selectively suppresses the neurons responsive to the associated visual stimulus after, but not before, learning. Our results are consistent with the interpretation that cross-modal associations can be stored in long-range cortical connections and that with learning these cross-modal connections function to suppress the responses to predictable input.
Abstract: From object detection to successful prey capture, insect aerial predators gather appropriate cues, make fast decisions and translate them into precise motor commands. To compensate for biological delays and noisy data, some dragonflies and robber fly species employ predictive strategies, in addition to visual feedback. Aerial predation therefore presents as an ideal substrate to investigate how animals with very limited resources deal with uncertainty in decision-making. In this talk, I will focus on the strategies that predatory aerial insects use when deciding whether to attack an object. In particular, we will compare the temporal and depth cues used by robber flies and damselflies. I will link the behavior to the neural and morphological adaptations, and discuss how they match particular ecological niches and evolutionary paths.
Bio: Paloma grew up in Malaga, a coastal city in southern Spain. She obtained her undergraduate degree from the University of Queensland (Australia; 2000- 2002) majoring in Zoology and Marine Biology. While at UQ, Paloma was an undergraduate in the Justin Marshall laboratory, part of what was the Vision, Touch and Hearing Research Centre (VTHRC), directed by Jack Pettigrew. During her PhD (U. of Sheffield, UK. 2006-2009) she studied the neural basis of visually guided predation in killer flies. For her work on the adaptations that can make a miniature fly deadly she received the Capranica Prize from the Society for Neuroethology. During a short postdoc at Janelia HHMI Campus (2010-2011), she studied the neural basis of predation on dragonflies, and was awarded the PNAS Cozzarelli prize for this work. A dream opportunity arose: to study the neural basis of camouflage on cephalopods at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL, MA). During her time at the MBL (2011-2013), in the Roger Hanlon Laboratory, she discovered a nerve that controls the tunable skin iridescence present in squid skin, and demonstrated that cuttlefish achieve texture in their skin with combinations of ‘catch-like’ muscles. In 2013 she started her own laboratory, the Fly Systems Lab, at the University of Cambridge (UK), which she moved to U. Minnesota in 2018. Her laboratory continues the focus on high quality, integrative and comparative work on predatory aerial insects, and was recently awarded the outstanding paper prize for Fabian et al. 2022, a study of interception through obstacles. In addition to her flight work, Paloma continues to work on cephalopods via collaborative efforts with the Wardill laboratory.
This seminar remains unscheduled for participation in the Undergraduate Research Symposium, held annually in May. For more information please visit the symposium website.
Past Events
15 minute talks start at 9:00 AM and end at 1:15 PM according to the schedule below
9:00 AM Jackie...
15 minute talks start at 9:00 AM and end at 1:15 PM according to the schedule below
9:00 AM Jackie Kuyat Sylwestrak 9:15 Gonzalo Morales Chaya Sylwestrak 9:30 JoAnna O’Neill Hutchinson (Psych) 9:45 Abbi Koenigsmark Eisen 10:00 Tim Reizis Smear (Psych)
10:15-10:30 BREAK,
10:30 Praves Lamichhane Wehr (Psych) 10:45 Leah Blankenship Jaramillo 11:00 Kasey Drake Huxtable 11:15 Christopher Fields Niell 11:30 Max Horrocks Miller 11:45 Michelle Ortman Mille
12:00-12:15 PM BREAK
12:15 Amberly Buer Cresko 12:30 Katya Podkovyroff Lewis Silva 12:45 Alejandro Santillana Fernandez Hallett 1:00 Elizabeth Diehl Sutherland
15 minute talks run from 9:00 AM to 10:30 AM according to the following schedule:
9:00 AM Maggie...
15 minute talks run from 9:00 AM to 10:30 AM according to the following schedule:
9:00 AM Maggie Barry Garcia (IMB) 9:15 Caroline Crahan Spero (IMB) 9:30 Mary Ruth Shifflett Prell (Chemistry) 9:45 Samara Williams Parthasarathy (Physics) 10:00 Aubrey Mayer Libuda (IMB) 10:15 Laurel Moneysmith Harms (IMB)