Papers Published

1. MA Nicolelis, EE Fanselow, Dynamic shifting in thalamocortical processing during different behavioural states., Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, England, vol. 357 no. 1428 (December, 2002), pp. 1753-8 .
   (last updated on 2004/01/12)

   Abstract:
   Recent experiments in our laboratory have indicated that as rats shift the behavioural strategy employed to explore their surrounding environment, there is a parallel change in the physiological properties of the neuronal ensembles that define the main thalamocortical loop of the trigeminal somatosensory system. Based on experimental evidence from several laboratories, we propose that this concurrent shift in behavioural strategy and thalamocortical physiological properties provides rats with an efficient way to optimize either the detection or analysis of complex tactile stimuli.

   Keywords:
   Animals • Behavior, Animal • Cerebral Cortex • Models, Neurological • Neural Pathways • Rats • Thalamus • physiology • physiology*