Credit: UMass Amherst
University of Massachusetts Amherst neuroscientists examining genetically identified neurons in a songbird s forebrain discovered a remarkable landscape of physiology, auditory coding and network roles that mirrored those in the brains of mammals.
The research, published May 13 in
Current Biology, advances insight into the fundamental operation of complex brain circuits. It suggests that ancient cell types in the pallium - the outer regions of the brain that include cortex - most likely retained features over millions of years that are the building blocks for advanced cognition in birds and mammals. We as neuroscientists are catching on that birds can do sophisticated things and they have sophisticated circuits to do those things, says behavioral neuroscientist Luke Remage-Healey, associate professor of psychological and brain sciences and senior author of the paper.