Université de Fribourg

Notch in memories: points to remember

Marathe, Swananda ; Alberi, Lavinia

In: Hippocampus, 2015, vol. 25, no. 7, p. 771–778

Memory is a temporally evolving molecular and structural process, which involves changes from local synapses to complex neural networks. There is increasing evidence for an involvement of developmental pathways in regulating synaptic communication in the adult nervous system. Notch signaling has been implicated in memory formation in a variety of species. Nevertheless, the mechanism of Notch...

Université de Fribourg

Hume on the Imagination

Dorsch, Fabian

In: The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Imagination

This chapter overviews Hume’s thoughts on the nature and the role of imagining, with an almost exclusive focus on the first book of his Treatise of Human Nature. Over the course of this text, Hume draws and discusses three important distinctions among our conscious mental episodes (or what he calls ‘perceptions’): (i) between impressions (including perceptual experiences) and ideas...

Université de Fribourg

Postnatal development of the hippocampal formation: A stereological study in macaque monkeys

Jabès, Adeline ; Banta Lavenex, Pamela A. ; Amaral, David G. ; Lavenex, Pierre

In: The Journal of Comparative Neurology, 2011, p. -

We performed a stereological analysis of neuron number, neuronal soma size, and volume of individual regions and layers of the macaque monkey hippocampal formation during early postnatal development. We found a protracted period of neuron addition in the dentate gyrus throughout the first postnatal year and a concomitant late maturation of the granule cell population and individual dentate...

Université de Fribourg

Effects of inbreeding on aversive learning in Drosophila

Nepoux, V. ; Haag, Christoph R. ; Kawecki, Tadeusz J.

In: Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 2010, p. -

Inbreeding adversely affects life history traits as well as various other fitness-related traits, but its effect on cognitive traits remains largely unexplored, despite their importance to fitness of many animals under natural conditions. We studied the effects of inbreeding on aversive learning (avoidance of an odour previously associated with mechanical shock) in multiple inbred lines of...

Université de Fribourg

Quantitative analysis of postnatal neurogenesis and neuron number in the macaque monkey dentate gyrus

Jabès, Adeline ; Banta Lavenex, Pamela A. ; Amaral, David G. ; Lavenex, Pierre

In: European Journal of Neuroscience, 2010, vol. 31, no. 2, p. 273-285

The dentate gyrus is one of only two regions of the mammalian brain where substantial neurogenesis occurs postnatally. However, detailed quantitative information about the postnatal structural maturation of the primate dentate gyrus is meager. We performed design-based, stereological studies of neuron number and size, and volume of the dentate gyrus layers in rhesus macaque monkeys (Macaca...

Université de Fribourg

Learning ability and longevity: a symmetrical evolutionary trade-off in Drosophila

Burger, Joep M. S. ; Kolss, Munjong ; Pont, Juliette ; Kawecki, Tadeusz J.

In: Evolution, 2008, vol. 62, no. 6, p. 1294–1304

Learning ability can be substantially improved by artificial selection in animals ranging from Drosophila to rats. Thus these species have not used their evolutionary potential with respect to learning ability, despite intuitively expected and experimentally demonstrated adaptive advantages of learning. This suggests that learning is costly, but this notion has rarely been tested. Here we report...

Université de Fribourg

Reduced learning ability as a consequence of evolutionary adaptation to nutritional stress in Drosophila melanogaster

Kolss, Munjong ; Kawecki, Tadeusz J.

In: Ecological Entomology, 2008///doi:10.1111/j.1365-2311.2008.01007.x

Abstract. 1. Dietary conditions affect cognitive abilities of many species, but it is unclear to what extent this physiological effect translates into an evolutionary relationship.2. A reduction of competitive ability under nutritional stress has been reported as a correlated response to selection for learning ability in Drosophila melanogaster. Here we test whether the reverse holds as well,...

Université de Fribourg

No trade-off between learning ability and parasitoid resistance in Drosophila melanogaster

Kolss, Munjong ; Kraaijeveld, A. R. ; Mery, Frederic ; Kawecki, Tadeusz J.

In: Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 2006, vol. 19, no. 4, p. 1359-1363

Learning ability and immunity to parasites are linked at the physiological level in several insect species. The aim of this work was to investigate the relationship between learning and immunity at an evolutionary level. We tested whether selection for improved learning ability in Drosophila melanogaster led to changes in parasitoid resistance as a correlated response. Similarly, we assayed...

Université de Fribourg

Genetically idiosyncratic responses of Drosophila melanogaster populations to selection for improved learning ability

Kawecki, Tadeusz J. ; Mery, Frederic

In: Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 2006, vol. 19, no. 4, p. 1265-1274

To what extent is adaptive evolution over short timescales repeatable? To address this question, we studied the performance of crosses between replicate Drosophila melanogaster lines previously subject to selection for improved learning response in the context of oviposition substrate choice. Of the 10 pairwise F1 crosses among the five selection lines, four performed in the original learning...