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    J Neurosci. 2005 Mar 9;25(10):2490-503.

    Plasticity in primary auditory cortex of monkeys with altered vocal production.

    Source

    Coleman Memorial Laboratory and W. M. Keck Center for Integrative Neuroscience, Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, University of California, San Francisco, California 94143-0342, USA. scheung@ohns.ucsf.edu

    Abstract

    Response properties of primary auditory cortical neurons in the adult common marmoset monkey (Callithrix jacchus) were modified by extensive exposure to altered vocalizations that were self-generated and rehearsed frequently. A laryngeal apparatus modification procedure permanently lowered the frequency content of the native twitter call, a complex communication vocalization consisting of a series of frequency modulation (FM) sweeps. Monkeys vocalized shortly after this procedure and maintained voicing efforts until physiological evaluation 5-15 months later. The altered twitter calls improved over time, with FM sweeps approaching but never reaching the normal spectral range. Neurons with characteristic frequencies <4.3 kHz that had been weakly activated by native twitter calls were recruited to encode self-uttered altered twitter vocalizations. These neurons showed a decrease in response magnitude and an increase in temporal dispersion of response timing to twitter call and parametric FM stimuli but a normal response profile to pure tone stimuli. Tonotopic maps in voice-modified monkeys were not distorted. These findings suggest a previously unrecognized form of cortical plasticity that is specific to higher-order processes involved in the discrimination of more complex sounds, such as species-specific vocalizations.

    PMID:
    15758157
    [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
    Free full text

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