Abstract
The song of a male zebra finch is a stereotyped motor sequence whose tempo varies with social context – whether or not the song is directed at a female bird – as well as with the time of day. The neural mechanisms underlying these changes in tempo are unknown. Here we show that brain temperature recorded in freely behaving male finches exhibits a global increase in response to the presentation of a female bird. This increase strongly correlates with, and largely explains, the faster tempo of songs directed at a female compared to songs produced in social isolation. Furthermore, we find that the observed diurnal variations in song tempo are also explained by natural variations in brain temperature. Our findings suggest that brain temperature is an important variable that can influence the dynamics of activity in neural circuits, as well as the temporal features of behaviors that some of these circuits generate.
Highlights
Many behaviors, such as displays of emotion, aggression and courtship rituals, as well as communication signals, are produced differently depending on the social context in which the behavior is generated [1,2]
Some songs are directed toward a nearby female bird (‘‘directed’’ singing); other songs, like those produced in social isolation, are not directed toward a female (‘‘undirected’’ singing) [3]
Bilateral lesions and inactivations of LMAN reduce song variability [5,8,13,14,15], eliminating the difference in variability between directed and undirected songs [5,8]. These and other studies have led to the suggestion that changes in LMAN activity are responsible for the social modulation of song variability, and that neuromodulatory inputs into LMAN or associated basal ganglia circuits may mediate these changes [7,9,16,17,18,19]
Summary
Many behaviors, such as displays of emotion, aggression and courtship rituals, as well as communication signals, are produced differently depending on the social context in which the behavior is generated [1,2]. Bilateral lesions and inactivations of LMAN reduce song variability [5,8,13,14,15], eliminating the difference in variability between directed and undirected songs [5,8]. These and other studies have led to the suggestion that changes in LMAN activity are responsible for the social modulation of song variability, and that neuromodulatory inputs into LMAN or associated basal ganglia circuits may mediate these changes [7,9,16,17,18,19]
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