QUICK SEARCH:   [advanced] Author: Keyword(s):
Home     Help     Feedback     Subscriptions     Archive     Search     Table of Contents

This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Kumashiro, M. Articles by Sakai, M. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Kumashiro, M. Articles by Sakai, M. Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Journal of Experimental Biology, Vol 204, Issue 6 1139-1152, Copyright © 2001 by Company of Biologists

JOURNAL ARTICLES

Reproductive behaviour in the male cricket Gryllus bimaculatus DeGeer. II. Neural control of the genitalia

M Kumashiro and M Sakai
Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Okayama University, Tsushima-Naka-3-1-1, Okayama 700-8530, Japan.

To understand the neural mechanisms of reproductive behaviour in the male cricket, we identified motor neurones innervating the muscles in each genital organ by backfilling with cobalt/nickel and recording their extracellular spike activity from nerve bundles of the terminal abdominal ganglion during tethered copulation and spermatophore formation. During tethered copulation, at least two motor neurones innervating two ipsilateral muscles were activated during projection of the guiding rod of the phallic dorsal pouch. Only one motor neurone, innervating four ipsilateral muscles of the dorsal pouch, was responsible for spermatophore extrusion by deforming the dorsal pouch. For spermatophore transfer, three motor neurones, singly innervating three epiphallus muscles, played a major role in opening passages for haemolymph to enter the ventral lobes and median pouch by bending the epiphallus. Two ventral lobe and 3-5 median pouch motor neurones seemed to play a role in expanding or folding the two membranous structures by relaxing or contracting their muscle fibres. After spermatophore transfer, most of the genital motor neurones exhibited a rhythmic burst of action potentials causing movement of the phallic complex coupled with strong abdominal contractions. For spermatophore formation, the genital motor neurones began to accelerate their rhythmic bursts approximately 30 s prior to subgenital plate opening and then changed their activity to tonic bursting or silence. The results have allowed us to describe the timing of the onset and termination of genital muscle contraction more precisely than before, to examine the neural mechanisms of copulatory motor control and to speculate on the neural organization of the reproductive centre for spermatophore extrusion and protrusion.
CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

				M. Kumashiro, Y. Tsuji, and M. Sakai Auto-spermatophore extrusion in male crickets J. Exp. Biol., December 15, 2003; 206(24): 4507 - 4519. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				M Kumashiro and M Sakai Reproductive behaviour in the male cricket Gryllus bimaculatus DeGeer. I. Structure and function of the genitalia J. Exp. Biol., January 3, 2001; 204(6): 1123 - 1137. [Abstract] [PDF]