Neuroethology - Modern Neuroethology

Modern Neuroethology

The International Society for Neuroethology represents the present discipline of neuroethology, which was founded on the occasion of the NATO-Advanced Study Institute "Advances in Vertebrate Neuroethology" (August 13–24, 1981) organized by J.-P. Ewert, D.J. Ingle and R.R. Capranica, held at the University of Kassel in Hofgeismar, Germany (cf. report Trends in Neurosci. 5:141-143,1982). Its first president was Theodore H. Bullock. The society has met every three years since its first meeting in Tokyo in 1986.

Its membership draws from many research programs around the world; many of its members are students and faculty members from medical schools and neurobiology departments from various universities. Modern advances in neurophysiology techniques have enabled more exacting approaches in an ever-increasing number of animal systems, as size limitations are being dramatically overcome. Survey of the most recent (2007) congress of the ISN meeting symposia topics gives some idea of the field’s breadth:

• Comparative aspects of spatial memory (rodents, birds, humans, bats)
• Influences of higher processing centers in active sensing (primates, owls, electric fish, rodents, frogs)
• Animal signaling plasticity over many time scales (electric fish, frogs, birds)
• Song production and learning in passerine birds
• Primate sociality
• Optimal function of sensory systems (flies, moths, frogs, fish)
• Neuronal complexity in behavior (insects, computational)
• Contributions of genes to behavior (Drosophila, honeybees, zebrafish)
• Eye and head movement (crustaceans, humans, robots)
• Hormonal actions in brain and behavior (rodents, primates, fish, frogs, and birds)
• Cognition in insects (honeybee)