A02 Elucidation of neural mechanisms of super-adaptation to body change

Research Outline

From the cradle to the grave, the musculoskeletal structure of the human body is changing continuously. It can change with a prolonged time constant with predictive manner, following a biological process of development and aging. It also could change immediately without any prediction, like a traffic accident and some disease. Notably, we can spend our daily life by using this changing body structure, with the aid of practice or rehabilitation therapy occasionally. This is a clear example that our central nervous system (CNS) could adapt and keep communicating with our body by making adaptive changes corresponding to the change of bodily structure predictably or unpredictably. So far, however, it is not established how the CNS adapts to the continuously changing body and what is the trigger of its adaptation.

We will address the CNS mechanism of “hyper-adaptiation” corresponding to the ever-changing musculoskeletal structure by establishing the novel animal models and the cutting-edge technology to evaluate their physiological and neuroanatomical processes. By developing the muscle relocation model, where the association of muscle activity and its physical action will be surgically or optogenetically manipulated, we will investigate how the CNS acquire control strategy of their body de novo. We will implement novel neurophysiological tools for assessing the hyper-adaptation occurring the multiple levels of the CNS, from the spinal cord, brain stem, and cerebral cortex. Data obtained by these experiments will be shared with other members of the hyper-adaptability area to establish a systems engineering model that could describe the shared mechanism of hyper-adaptation in the multiple CNS levels.

Members

Principal investigator	Kazuhiko SEKI	Director, NCNP
Co-investigator	Shinji KUBOTA	Section chief, NCNP
	Yuki HARA	Orthopedic director, NCNP Hospital
	Roland PHILLIPP	Postdoctoral fellow, NCNP
	Amit YARON	Postdoctoral fellow, NCNP
	Akito KOSUGI	Postdoctoral fellow, NCNP
	Satomi KIKUTA	Postdoctoral fellow, NCNP
	Junichiro YOSHIDA	Postdoctoral fellow, NCNP
	Shun NAKAMURA	Undergraduate Student, NCNP
	Shiro EGAWA	Special Postdoctoral Researcher, RIKEN Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research