Welcome to module 3, which deals with the topic of Time in the nervous system.

The first and last lectures will deal directly with human perception nd consciousness, in the context of timing. In between we will deal with some model systems that use the nervous sytem of animals and the disciplne of neuroethology.

The topic of neural  time is not handled to any extent in text-books, with the exception of circadian rhythms, so you will need to listen to lectures, which are summarised on this website. Note that this material notes, the Lecture notes and the Powerpoint presentations linked below, contain much more material than wouldbe necessary to answer the MCQs on the end of semester exam. All of these questions will be taken from material delivered in the lectures, not from the webnotes. NO questions will be answered concerning which parts of these webnotes are relevant ot the exam. Come to the lectures to find that out.

For a dynamic view of brain function, like that presented in this module, see the readable and stimulating account by Ramachandran and Blakeslee, Phantoms in the Brain.

A helpful introduction to the topic, especially for human relevance, is Time Out of Mind: But note that there are other species where we have much better information about how time is encoded and measured by the nervous system than we do in humans, such as electric fish (Lecture 2) and even bacteria (Lecture 4).

The approach taken is neuroethoogical. Neuroethology is the study of brain (neuro) and behaviour (ethology). We will start with a demonstration of striking perceptual changes taking place with a regular timecourse in ourselves. After a series of lectures on other biological time keeping, we will finish in Lecture 6 with a discussion of normal and altered consciousness that reflects Niko Tinbergen's wish to incorporate the principles of animal ethoogy to human psychology. We will only be partly successful in achieving Tinbergen's wish, but we will make a little progress in the difficult process of explaining subjective phenomena, like altered consciousness,  in neural terms.

Lecture Summary: Biorhythms Module of BIOM 2006
 

Lecture	Key Concept 1	Key Concept 2	Theme Brain Region	Time Frame	Theme organism
1 Rivalry Demo	Co-incidence and plasticity	Dynamic vs Static Organisation	Cerebral Hemispheres I	milliseconds-days	Human
2 Precision Timing	Efference copy	Time-to-Place Brain Map	Cerebellum	nanoseconds	Electric Fish (Gymnarchus)
3 Microseond Timing	Feynman's Master Clock	Biological Oscillators	Cerebral Hemispheres II: Multiple Cortical Maps.	microseconds	Mustache bat
4	Range of Biological Oscillators	Oxidative Damage
5	Circadian Oscillator	Phase Shift by Zeitgeber	Suprachiasmatic Nucleus	days	Drosophila, hamster
6	Coupled Oscillators	Consciousness and the Rivalry Switch	Brainstem Pacemakers (VTA,LCetc)	seconds-days	Primates

Lecture 1: Prof Pettigrew
A. Class Demonstration of Perceptual Rivalry Switches: Brain Action Unprovoked by Sensory Input:

B. Summary of the 6 lectures in the Module:
 Neuronal Diversity and Numbers: Human Brain as the most complex structure in the known universe.
 Theme Brain Regions: Cerebral hemispheres, cerebellum, brainstem nuclei, hypothalamus and thalmus, basal ganglia.
 Dealing with time in the nervous system:
 Dynamic vs, Static (Anatomical) Properties of Brain
Two kinds of plasticity: LTP vs LTD
 Constructing representations:
      .Genetic algorithms and topographic maps
      .Self-assembling networks: activity-dependent connections
Oscillators and switches

Lecture 1: Prof Pettigrew
Coincidence Detection
 Theme Brain Region: Cerebral Hemispheres I
Hierarchy from Primary Neocortex to Archicortex (hippocampus).
Somatotopic map vs. Somatotopic plasticity
Self-illusions caused by "suspicious coincidences":
 a. Hand  example;
 b. Nose example;
 c. Head example;
 d. Ketamine
Constructing self:
 Hebb synapses: foreshadow anti-Hebb
 Coincidence detection:
  Hippocampus   Declarative memory
  Cerebellum       Procedural memory

Click here for Detailed Notes, Sources and Websites for Lecture 1.
Powerpoint Presentation of Lecture 1

Lecture 2: Prof Pettigrew
Nanosecond Timing: Electric Fish
Theme brain Region: Cerebellum:
Contrast cerebellar and cerebral kinds of information storage.
Declarative memory vs. Procedural memory

Why study electric fish?
Nature of the: task: detecting minute electrical stimuli of prey in the water that are  thousands of times smaller than the electrical stimuli you generate as you move:
Efference copy (reafference):
Helmholtz experiment
Hallucinations in humans: Vocalisations with poorly-tuned efference copy.
Pain as discrepancy:
Thong len: meditating away discrepancy
Electrophysiology of the electric fish torus (looks very like the cerebellum with the same kinds of neurons and connections): Anti-Hebbian plasticity

Human cerebellum
Cerebellar plasticity
Summary of Hebbian vs. anti-Hebbian plasticity
Hippocampal (Declarative) vs Cerebellar (Procedural) Memory

Click here for Detailed Notes, Sources and Websites for Lecture 2.
Powerpoint Presentation of Lecture 2
 

Lecture 3: Prof. Pettigrew
Theme Brain Region: Cerebral Cortex II: Multiple Cortical Maps

What cortical region does what, an outline of visual, somatosensory, motor, olfactory, auditory and prefrontal cortex
Specialized processing within these cortical regions - multiple maps
Plasticity of cortical maps in amputees
Hierarchical vs. distributed processing

Click Here for Notes on Lecture 3
Click here for Powepoint Presentation of Lecture 3
 

Lecture 4: Prof Pettigrew
Oscillators: Bacterial Chemotaxis to Human Emotion
Theme Brain Region: Brain Stem Switches: Locus coeruleus, Raphe etc
Experiential time: Penfield's experiment
Interval time: counting the ticks: fMRI of basal ganglia
Circadian time: Light on the knee
Parisian Parkinson's experiment
The "two clock" thought experiment
Making time stop subjectively
Do bacteria have moods?!
Biological oscillators

Coupled ultradian and circadian rhythms

Click here for Detailed Notes, Sources and Websites for Lecture 4.
Powerpoint presentation of Lecture 4
 
 

Lecture 5: Prof Pettigrew
Circadian Rhythms:
Theme Region: Hypothalamic Suprachiasmatic Nucleus (SCN).
Clock genes: Per, tim, clock, cry: transcriptional regulation of the circadian clock.
Melanopsin in the retina
Hypothalamic SCN and melatonin
Oscillators and Zeitgebers: The science of jetlag
The mystery of sleep: Rip van Winkle revisited: Sleep, oxidative damage and ageing

Click here for Detailed Notes, Sources and Websites for Lecture 5.
Powerpoint presentation of Lecture 5
 
 

Lecture 6: Consciousness
Theme Brain Region: Regional specialization in circuit structure

Uniformity vs. non-uniformity of cortical structure
Examples from visual cortex
Prefrontal cortex: evolution of structure and function

Click Here for Notes.
Click Here for Powerpoint Presentation
 

Note:
1. I have provided PowerPoint presentations of some of the lectures for completeness and because these were requested by students last year. I do not expect anyone to memorise all the details on these graphics! On the other hand, I do expect some retention of the html notes on the lectures.

2. Using web resources:
Those students interested in following up a particular area of interest might be interested in the following method, which is one I use regularly every day, sometimes more than that.

PubMed provides a direct access to original sources, which can then be browsed in those cases where UQ has a licence. This means that you can have easy direct access, as a UQ student, to original sources. For this to work at home from a modem, note that you have to set the Proxy on your web browser (http-proxy.uq.edu.au     if you are using Explorer).

To get to PubMed, click on   http://www4.ncbi.nlm.nih.g ov/entrez/query.fcgi
Then enter your query.

Say you wanted to read more of Moo Ming Poo's elegant papers on the plasticity of individual synapses between identified neurons in culture, mentioned honourably in Lecture 1.
Enter       poo mm   and you will be given a list.

Click on your title of interest for a Summary. Coloured logos of the publisher indicate those articles where UQ has on-line access to the journal.

In Moo Ming's case the JNeuroscience article from which I took the figure for Lecture 1 shows how these historic data were obtained.

I am not recommending this as a routine, but in those cases where you are keen to get some more detail on some of the hyperbole about the brain and about neuroscientists in the classthat I will present.

I know that a busy undergraduate will have little time for activities like this, and the information available may be overwhelming. On the other hand, you have a unique opportunity to take advantage of. As they say on SBS, "The world is an amazing place". This is nowhere truer than the world of brain research.