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Andrew H. Bass     (WEB PAGE) ahb3 @ cornell.edu W239 Hudd Hall      607-254-4372   [edit] Faculty associated with: Boris P. Chagnaud,   Aaron N. Rice Department: Neurobiology and Behavior Field: Neurobiology and Behavior Keywords: Auditory Neuroscience (5), Cell and Molecular Neuroscience (23), Fish (12), Motor Systems (13), Neuroendocrinology (7), Neuroethology (24), Systems Neuroscience (25), Vocal Motor Systems (3) The goal of my research program is to show how phenotypic variation in brain organization leads to adaptive behavioral phenotypes. It is in this context that our laboratory studies sound-producing/ vocalizing fish as model systems to establish how the vocal and auditory systems of vertebrates function to produce adaptive behavioral responses. All of these studies are carried out in the context of a deep understanding of the animal's natural habitat and the use of vocal signals in their social behavior. Given the historical perspective that the most fundamental mechanisms of vertebrate hearing and vocalization originated among fishes, the potential impact of such studies on our general understanding of the evolution, development and adaptive modification of auditory, vocal and audio-vocal mechanisms is far reaching. Research in our laboratory focuses on neuroendocrine influences on sex and seasonal differences in the morphology and physiology of an extensive hindbrain-spinal, pacemaker-motor neuron circuit that establishes the fundamental properties of natural vocalizations and on the temporal and spectral coding of those acoustic signals by the peripheral and central auditory systems. Many of these projects revolve around studies of alternative mating tactics in teleost fish with two male morphs that differ in a large suite of behavioral, neurobiological and endocrine traits including divergent acoustic courtship behaviors and vocal control pathways. We answer questions regarding the existence of behaviors and their underlying mechanisms using an interdisciplinary, neuroethological approach that combines field studies of vocal communication with laboratory studies of the nervous system that utilize one or more of the following approaches: neurophysiology combined with anatomical tract tracing, neuroendocrinology, electron microscopy, immunocytochemistry, and in situ hybridization. Also visit my Research/Photo Gallery entry

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