Influence of Magnitude and Duration of Altered Gravity and Readaptation to 1 g on the Structure and Function of the Utricle in Toadfish, <i>Opsanus tau</i>.

ABSTRACT: Gravity has remained constant during animal evolution and the neural sensory systems detecting acceleration forces have remained remarkably conserved among vertebrates. The utricular organ senses the sum of inertial force due to head translation and head tilt relative to gravitational vertical. Change in gravitational force would be expected to have profound effects on how an organism maintains equilibrium. We characterize the physiology of utricular afferents to applied accelerations in the oyster toadfish, Opsanus tau, in normal 1 g to establish benchmarks, after 1-32-day exposures to 2.24 g (resultant) via centrifugation (hypergravity, HG), after 4- and 16-day exposures to 1.12 g (resultant), and following 1-8 days recovery to HG exposures to study re-adaptation to 1 g. Afferents

SUBMITTER: Boyle R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6204554 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature