Neuronal correlates of association learning and memory in the carrion crow

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Andreas Nieder
• Subject Area: Cognitive, Systems and Behavioural Neurobiology
• Term: from 2015 to 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 273724012

Many of the learned, adaptive behaviors of animals depend on arbitrary associations between stimuli. To that aim, behaviorally relevant stimuli from different sense organs need to be related across time and modalities. The guiding of behavior by stimulus associations requires both short-term memory to bridge time intervals, as well as long-term memory storage of learnt relationships. In nonhuman primates, such integrative brain functions are typically assigned to the workings of the prefrontal cortex. Birds, however, lack a six-layered neocortex and show a very differently organized endbrain. Instead, the associative telencephalic brain area termed nidopallium caudolaterale (NCL) has been related to high-level cognitive processing in birds. This brain area is particularly prominent in highly intelligent corvid songbirds. The purpose of the proposed research project is to understand if and how neuronal activity of NCL neurons contributes to memory representations between sensory stimuli. We will approach this issue by training carrion crows (Corvus corone) to learn to associate sensory stimuli and later we will compare the crows performance while practicing novel associations with their performance on familiar (uni-modal and cross-modal) associations. At the same time, the activity of populations of neurons in the corvid NCL will be recorded. We will study how neuronal memory signals emerge during associative learning, how they can be activated by input from multiple sensory modalities, and how they may circumvent or suppress distractor stimuli. This will allow us to compare expected differences and commonalities of the neuronal basis of association memory in crows to findings in nonhuman primates. Such insights will foster our understanding of how bird brains give rise to associative short- and long-term memories based on convergent evolution, and which evolutionary constraints exist for the design of intelligent vertebrate brains.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants