|
| |
|
|
|
|
||||
| Home Help Feedback Subscriptions Archive Search Table of Contents | ||||
Journal of Experimental Biology, Vol 146, Issue 1 39-62, Copyright © 1989 by Company of Biologists
JOURNAL ARTICLES |
SB Laughlin
Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, England.
Adaptation, a change in response to a sustained stimulus, is a widespread property of sensory systems, occurring at many stages, from the most peripheral energy-gathering structures to neural networks. Adaptation is also implemented at many levels of biological organization, from the molecule to the organ. Despite adaptation's diversity, it is fruitful to extract some unifying principles by considering well-characterized components of the insect visual system. A major function of adaptation is to increase the amount of sensory information an organism uses. The amount of information available to an organism is ultimately defined by its environment and its size. The amount of information collected depends upon the ways in which an organism samples and transduces signals. The amount of information that is used is further limited by internal losses during transmission and processing. Adaptation can increase information capture and reduce internal losses by minimizing the effects of physical and biophysical constraints. Optical adaptation mechanisms in compound eyes illustrate a common trade-off between energy (quantum catch) and acuity (sensitivity to changes in the distribution of energy). This trade-off can be carefully regulated to maximize the information gathered (i.e. the number of pictures an eye can reconstruct). Similar trade-offs can be performed neurally by area summation mechanisms. Light adaptation in photoreceptors introduces the roles played by cellular constraints in limiting the available information. Adaptation mechanisms prevent saturation and, by trading gain for temporal acuity, increase the rate of information uptake. By minimizing the constraint of nonlinear summation (imposed by membrane conductance mechanisms) a cell's sensitivity follows the Weber-Fechner law. Thus, a computationally advantageous transformation is generated in response to a cellular constraint. The synaptic transfer of signals from photoreceptors to second-order neurones emphasizes that the cellular constraints of nonlinearity, noise and dynamic range limit the transmission of information from cell to cell. Synaptic amplification is increased to reduce the effects of noise but this resurrects the constraint of dynamic range. Adaptation mechanisms, both confined to single synapses and distributed in networks, remove spatially and temporally redundant signal components to help accommodate more information within a single cell. The net effect is a computationally advantageous removal of the background signal. Again, the cellular constraints on information transfer have dictated a computationally advantageous operation.
This article has been cited by other articles:
|
|
 |
|
  N. R. Wilson, M. T. Ty, D. E. Ingber, M. Sur, and G. Liu Synaptic Reorganization in Scaled Networks of Controlled Size J. Neurosci., December 12, 2007; 27(50): 13581 - 13589. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
M. Avissar, A. C. Furman, J. C. Saunders, and T. D. Parsons Adaptation Reduces Spike-Count Reliability, But Not Spike-Timing Precision, of Auditory Nerve Responses J. Neurosci., June 13, 2007; 27(24): 6461 - 6472. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 B. A. Mello and Y. Tu Effects of Adaptation in Maintaining High Sensitivity over a Wide Range of Backgrounds for Escherichia coli Chemotaxis Biophys. J., April 1, 2007; 92(7): 2329 - 2337. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 R. B. Lotto and L. Chittka Seeing the light: Illumination as a contextual cue to color choice behavior in bumblebees PNAS, March 8, 2005; 102(10): 3852 - 3856. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 V. Wolfram and M. Juusola Impact of Rearing Conditions and Short-Term Light Exposure on Signaling Performance in Drosophila Photoreceptors J Neurophysiol, September 1, 2004; 92(3): 1918 - 1927. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
N. J. Ingham and D. McAlpine Spike-Frequency Adaptation in the Inferior Colliculus J Neurophysiol, February 1, 2004; 91(2): 632 - 645. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
R. J. Calin-Jageman and T. M. Fischer Synaptic Augmentation Contributes to Environment-Driven Regulation of the Aplysia Siphon-Withdrawal Reflex J. Neurosci., December 17, 2003; 23(37): 11611 - 11620. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 L. Chittka and J. Tautz The spectral input to honeybee visual odometry J. Exp. Biol., July 15, 2003; 206(14): 2393 - 2397. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
A. Si, M. V. Srinivasan, and S. Zhang Honeybee navigation: properties of the visually driven `odometer' J. Exp. Biol., April 15, 2003; 206(8): 1265 - 1273. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
J. Oestreich and H. H. Zakon The Long-Term Resetting of a Brainstem Pacemaker Nucleus by Synaptic Input: A Model for Sensorimotor Adaptation J. Neurosci., September 15, 2002; 22(18): 8287 - 8296. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 N. M. Grzywacz and R. M. Balboa A Bayesian Framework for Sensory Adaptation Neural Comput., March 1, 2002; 14(3): 543 - 559. [Abstract] [Full Text]
|
|
|
|
|
|
B. G. Burton, B. W. Tatler, and S. B. Laughlin Variations in Photoreceptor Response Dynamics Across the Fly Retina J Neurophysiol, August 1, 2001; 86(2): 950 - 960. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
J. Oberwinkler and D. G. Stavenga Calcium Transients in the Rhabdomeres of Dark- and Light-Adapted Fly Photoreceptor Cells J. Neurosci., March 1, 2000; 20(5): 1701 - 1709. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
V Givois and G. Pollack Sensory habituation of auditory receptor neurons: implications for sound localization J. Exp. Biol., January 9, 2000; 203(17): 2529 - 2537. [Abstract] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
E. Salcedo, A. Huber, S. Henrich, L. V. Chadwell, W.-H. Chou, R. Paulsen, and S. G. Britt Blue- and Green-Absorbing Visual Pigments of Drosophila: Ectopic Expression and Physiological Characterization of the R8 Photoreceptor Cell-Specific Rh5 and Rh6 Rhodopsins J. Neurosci., December 15, 1999; 19(24): 10716 - 10726. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
W. D. Chapple Regulation of Muscle Stiffness During Periodic Length Changes in the Isolated Abdomen of the Hermit Crab J Neurophysiol, September 1, 1997; 78(3): 1491 - 1503. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
H. Clague, F. Theunissen, and J. P. Miller Effects of Adaptation on Neural Coding by Primary Sensory Interneurons in the Cricket Cercal System J Neurophysiol, January 1, 1997; 77(1): 207 - 220. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
