Early Auditory Experience Modifies Neuronal Firing Properties in the Zebra Finch Auditory Cortex.

ABSTRACT: Songbirds learn to sing much as humans learn to speak. In zebra finches, one of the premier songbird models, males learn to sing for later courtship through a multistep learning process during the developmental period. They first listen to and memorize the song of a tutor (normally their father) during the sensory learning period. Then, in the subsequent sensory-motor learning phase (with large overlap), they match their vocalizations to the memorized tutor song via auditory feedback and develop their own unique songs, which they maintain throughout their lives. Previous studies have suggested that memories of tutor songs are shaped in the caudomedial nidopallium (NCM) of the brain, which is analogous to the mammalian higher auditory cortex. Isolation during development, which exten

SUBMITTER: Kudo T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7578418 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature