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Neurons and Networks Underlying Singing Behaviour

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The Cricket as a Model Organism

Abstract

In cricket brains a neuropil area in the anterior ventral protocerebrum next to the pedunculus and the α-lobe is involved in the control of singing behaviour. Command interneurons for singing have dendrites in this neuropil, whereas their axon descends towards the ventral nerve cord. A bilateral calling song command neuron has been identified which drives the singing central pattern generator with tonic spike activity. The control of courtship and rivalry song via the brain is not yet resolved at a cellular level. Electrical and pharmacological brain stimulation reliably elicit normal and fictive singing in crickets. The central pattern generating network for singing seems to extend from the metathoracic ganglion complex to the first unfused abdominal ganglion A3. Crickets immediately stop singing and do not recover, once the connectives anterior to A3 are cut. Opener interneurons have been identified in A3, which modify and reset the singing motor pattern. The response properties of opener and closer interneurons upon hyperpolarising current injection indicate that post-inhibitory rebound mechanisms may be central to motor pattern generation underlying singing. Recordings of flight interneurons and singing interneurons prove that both motor patterns are controlled by separate neuronal networks.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Biology, Leipzig University, Talstraße 33, 04103, Leipzig, Germany

    Stefan Schöneich

  2. Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, CB2 3EJ, UK

    Berthold Hedwig

Authors
  1. Stefan Schöneich
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  2. Berthold Hedwig
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Correspondence to Berthold Hedwig .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Departments of Biology and Neuroscience, Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine, USA

    Hadley Wilson Horch

  2. Graduate school of Bioscience and Bioindustry, Tokushima University, Tokushima, Japan

    Taro Mito

  3. Biological Sciences Department, Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan, USA

    Aleksandar Popadić

  4. Department of Cytology and Histology, Okayama University, Okayama, Japan

    Hideyo Ohuchi

  5. Dentistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Okayama University Graduate School of Medicine, Okayama, Japan

    Sumihare Noji

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Schöneich, S., Hedwig, B. (2017). Neurons and Networks Underlying Singing Behaviour. In: Horch, H., Mito, T., Popadić, A., Ohuchi, H., Noji, S. (eds) The Cricket as a Model Organism. Springer, Tokyo. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-56478-2_10

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