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Some Approaches to Quantitative Dendritic Morphology

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Abstract

The availability of powerful desktop computers and of a large amount of detailed data about the morphology of a wide variety of neurons has led to the development of computational approaches that are designed to synthesize such data into biologically meaningful patterns. The hope is, of course, that the emerging patterns will provide clues to the factors that control the formation of neuronal dendrites during development, as well as their maintenance in the adult animal. One class of approaches to this problem is to develop quantitative computational models that can reproduce as many aspects of the original data as possible. The development of such simulations requires analysis of the original data that is directed by the model requirements, and their relative success depends on detailed comparisons between model outputs and the original data sets. Refinement of the models may require not only new experiments, as in other scientific disciplines, but also new ways of looking at the data already in hand. This chapter discusses some examples of this process, with emphasis on spinal motoneurons.

“If ye canna mak a model, then ye dinna understand it.”

(Attributed to Lord Kelvin)

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Authors
  1. Robert E. Burke
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  2. William B. Marks
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Krasnow Institute for Advanced Study and Psychology Department, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA, USA

    Giorgio A. Ascoli PhD

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Burke, R.E., Marks, W.B. (2002). Some Approaches to Quantitative Dendritic Morphology. In: Ascoli, G.A. (eds) Computational Neuroanatomy. Humana Press, Totowa, NJ. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-59259-275-3_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-59259-275-3_2

  • Publisher Name: Humana Press, Totowa, NJ

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-61737-297-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-59259-275-3

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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