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Light-evoked walking in crayfish: Behavioral and neuronal responses triggered by the caudal photoreceptor

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Summary

The caudal photoreceptors (CPRs) of crayfish (Procambarus clarkii) can trigger walking and abdominal movements by their response to light.

  1. 1.

    In a restrained, inverted crayfish, illumination of A6 evoked a CPR discharge followed by leg movements and bursting from the abdominal tonic flexor (TF) motoneurons. Intracellular electrical stimulation of a single CPR at high frequency (80 Hz) evoked similar responses.

  2. 2.

    Responses only occurred when a single CPR axon was driven at 60 Hz or more and outlasted the stimulus.

  3. 3.

    CPR stimulation also excites the pattern-initiating network (Moore and Larimer 1987) in the abdomen.

  4. 4.

    The axon of the CPR projects from ganglion A6 to the brain. Terminal branches occur in the subesophageal ganglion and the brain. A small descending interneuron is dye-coupled to CPR in the subesophageal ganglion.

  5. 5.

    In animals with cut circumesophageal connectives, the CPRs can evoke walking and the abdominal motor pattern.

  6. 6.

    The relationship of the abdominal motor pattern to walking is altered by restraint and/or inversion. In freely moving crayfish, the cyclic abdominal motor pattern is only observed with backward walking. In restrained, inverted crayfish, the motor pattern occurs with both forward or backward walking.

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Abbreviations

CPR :

caudal photoreceptor

TF :

tonic flexor

BW :

backward walking

FW :

forward walking

LM :

leg movement

CEC :

circumesophageal connective

SCD :

spike count difference

A1–A6 :

abdominal ganglia 1 through 6

T1–T5 :

thoracic ganglia 1 through 5

Sub :

subesophageal ganglion

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Author notes

  1. Ted W. Simon

    Present address: Department of Biology, Emory University, 1555 Pierce Drive, 30322, Atlanta, Georgia, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology, Georgia State University, 30303, Atlanta, GA, USA

    Ted W. Simon & Donald H. Edwards

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  1. Ted W. Simon
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  2. Donald H. Edwards
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Simon, T.W., Edwards, D.H. Light-evoked walking in crayfish: Behavioral and neuronal responses triggered by the caudal photoreceptor. J Comp Physiol A 166, 745–755 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00187319

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