John G. Hildebrand Elected Member of German Academy of Sciences

Former ISN president John G. Hildebrand, Ph.D., Regents Professor and Director of the Arizona Research Laboratories Division of Neurobiology at the University of Arizona, has been elected to membership in the Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina. Founded 350 years ago and based in the city of Halle, the Leopoldina is the world's oldest academy of sciences in continuous existence. Two thirds of the members of the Leopoldina come from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland and one third from other countries of the world. Election to membership is based on accomplishments and recognition in scientific research and is a high honor.

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RESEARCH GROUP REPORT~Cornell's Section of Neurobiology and the Roots of Neuroethology

Cornell's Section of Neurobiology and the Roots of Neuroethology. An informal history

by Ron Hoy

I gather from our departmental historians that the world's first Department of Neurobiology and Behavior (NB&B) was founded at Cornell University in 1966. Its creation came about from the formation of the Division of Biological Sciences, which was, in turn, created from the dissolution of the Departments of Zoology and Botany. From its beginnings, the work of some NB&B faculty presaged what would become neuroethology. Among the section's founding members were, from entomology, Bill Keeton, famed for his analysis of magnetic field orientation in homing pigeons, and Tom Eisner, the cofounder of the field of chemical ecology. From the old Department of Conservation came Bill Dilger, who was a pioneer in behavioral ornithology and who made a prescient study of the behavioral genetics of nest building in lovebirds. From Psychology came Frank Rosenblatt, who was deeply involved in the design and construction of "Perceptrons," which anticipated important issues in a discipline that we can now recognize as robotics. From this stimulating cohort was nourished the careers of a group of younger colleagues such as Charlie Walcott, who would himself study the magnetic sense of pigeons; Roger Payne, from the Natural Resources Department, who would distinguish himself as the "guru" of the songs of the humpback whale; and Howie Howland, who stayed on as a faculty member to work on comparative vision.

From 1966 to 1970, NB&B had recruited two faculty who would leave their mark on neuroethology, Bob Capranica and Jeff Camhi. Bob came to Cornell from Bell Labs after having just completed a monumental study of how the bullfrog's auditory system encodes the various components of its mating call, bringing to bear the sophisticated techniques of acoustic engineering. Bob was very influential nationally and was an advocate for neuroethology at the international level, and he is among the "founding fathers" of the Society for Neuroethology; he defended the position that our discipline should be broadly inclusive, that invertebrate studies should have equal standing with vertebrate studies. He also served on the editorial board of the Journal of Comparative Physiology in the 1970s and 1980s when neuroethology was really establishing its identity within the broader categories of behavioral neuroscience. Jeff Camhi's traces his lineage to the late Ken Roeder of moth and bat fame. Jeff came to Cornell having just completed his Ph.D. on how wind stimulated a locust's "facial hairs" to influence its steering in flight. Jeff would gain later fame by turning his attention to hairs on the other end of an insect (American cockroaches) with his studies of the cercal receptor giant interneuron system that drives the roach's directional walking; they are fine examples of the neuroethological approach. Jeff later authored the field's classic textbook, "Neuroethology", in 1984. Bob and another 1960s faculty recruit, Jack Bradbury, started the famous Animal Communication course in 1969, which trained a generation of students. In 1998, almost 20 years later, Jack and Sandy Vehrencamp published their textbook, "Principles of Animal Communication," which retains echoes of that course.

In the early 1970s, Jack Bradbury left for San Diego, and I was hired to be his replacement, joining Bob to teach in the Animal Communication course. My research is on acoustic communication in crickets, but my intellectual roots are in the "West Coast School" of invertebrate neurobiology, having started out on crayfish with Don Kennedy. I also owe a great intellectual debt to Franz Huber and Ken Roeder and their writings on insect neurobiology. Inspired by Roeder's example, my lab, which has long been populated with a remarkable group of gifted, congenial graduate students and postdocs, has investigated the neurobehavioral basis of the ultrasound escape response in insects for the past 20 years. In 1979, Ron Harris Warrick joined NB&B. His work on neuromodulation in a key central pattern-generating network, the stomatogastric ganglion of the lobster, links neuroethology to important work on the neuropharmacology of synapses and ionic currents. Neuroethology must accommodate molecular approaches to neural systems and Ron's research is an important tap root. In the early 1980s, Jeff Camhi left Cornell to establish an important outpost for neuroethology in Israel, but his departure was offset by the arrival of two neuroethologists. Carl Hopkins brought with him one of the classic preparations of neuroethology, the weakly electric fishes, and his "electrosystematics" program continues to the present. In the mid 1980s, Andy Bass joined the neuroethology faculty and he has developed the midshipman fish and its acoustic behavior into a fascinating example of neuroethological research. Andy's emphasis on functional neuroanatomy makes sure that our graduate students understand the relationship between form and function. Both Andy's and Carl's research programs have essential field (in their cases, I should say aquatic) components in which much of the behavioral work is done on natural populations of animals. This is one way that the neuroethological approach to the study of the neural basis of behavior differs from other ways. Ron Booker, who came in the late 1980s, contributes to our program with his studies of hormones and behavior in Manduca sexta. The bridge between biological psychology and NB&B is well trodden and is greatly strengthened by joint appointees between the two departments, such as Elizabeth Adkins Regan, Barbara Finlay, and Bruce Halpern. Elizabeth works on the behavioral endocrinology in birds, Barbara on the developmental neurobiology of the mammalian visual system, and Bruce on the olfactory and gustatory systems of vertebrates. In addition, other biopsychologists on campus, Bob Johnston and Tim DeVoogd, also have neuroethological outlooks on mammals and birds, respectively. The neuroethologists at Cornell have also benefitted from the university's Entomology Department, given that several of us work on insects, e.g., Cole Gilbert, who works on the behavior and physiology of insect vision.

Another strong theme that runs through much of NB&B's program in neuroethology is its emphasis on animal communication, especially on bioacoustics. It is especially fortunate but perhaps not accidental that the emergence of bioacoustics at Cornell has coincided with its close collaborative linkages to the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology (CLO), which has been a mecca for the study of birds for over a half century. In particular, when Charlie Walcott returned to Cornell to be Director of the CLO, one of his missions was to make it a first rate place in which to do bioacoustics research. To this end, he appointed Chris Clark (who did his Ph.D. on whalesong with Roger Payne and Charlie) to build a program in bioacoustics under his leadership. Chris' program is now a leading center for cetacean bioacoustics research. The most recent "migratory return" to Cornell and to the CLO is that of Jack Bradbury and Sandy Vehrencamp. Jack will be Director of CLO's Library of Natural Sounds, the world's largest archive of birdsongs. Sandy's game theory-oriented research on birds has an acoustic orientation as well. Chris, Jack, and Sandy are jointly appointed in NB&B and will be training graduate students and postdocs in bioacoustics, and their presence greatly enhances our research program in animal communication.

At Cornell, the neuroethologists both preach and practice the "credo" that comparative studies of brain and behavior must be done within an evolutionary context. Thus we are fortunate to have outstanding behavior colleagues in the area of sociobiology/behav-ioral ecology, Tom Seeley, Kern Reeve, Paul Sherman, Steve Emlen, Kraig Adler, and Tom Eisner. They helped lead the transition from classical ethology into behavioral ecology. Our graduate students and postdocs have benefitted from the opportunity to cast their ideas about how a given neural system might have evolved within the framework of natural and sexual selection, and have these notions batted around by our colleagues from the behavioral side of the hallway.

This personal reminiscence is a strictly anecdotal take on how the study of neuroethology came to be established within a particular biology department. The Section of Neurobiology and Behavior has been fortunate to have a critical mass of investigators who attracted bright graduate students and postdocs throughout its history. Through their efforts, and especially those of Bob Capranica, they have helped to fledge neuroethology in the USA.

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AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

Dr. Zvi Wollberg
Department of Zoology
University of Tel Aviv, Israel
wollberg@ccsg.tau.ac.il

I am a member of the Neuroethology Society. I pay my dues. I attend the meetings, and I faithfully read the Newsletter. Namely, I am a neuroethologist. But still I don't know exactly what this means. As Jews, we face a similar dilemma: Ben-Gurion, first Prime Minister of Israel, established a committee of theologians, rabbis, philosophers, scientists and politicians to define "who is a Jew"? All they could agree on after months of debate was "a Jew is someone whom non-Jews consider a Jew." This apparently also holds true for neuroethology: a neuroethologist is someone whom others consider as such. Thus, defined by others, I was asked by Art Popper to write an anecdotal autobiographical sketch. In a moment of weakness I agreed.

Well, I was born on February 4, 1937 in Israel then Palestine, a British mandate. Fortunately, my parents had left Germany four years earlier after Hitler became Chancellor. My brother and three sisters had been born in Germany, and my parents decided to have at least one "Sabra," as Israeli-born children are nicknamed. "Sabra" is the name of a widespread spiny cactus (Opuntia) whose fruit is very prickly outside and very soft and sweet inside, believed to reflect the Israeli character.

I grew up, in the shadow of World War II, in a small, idealistic, and Spartan society in which the two foremost goals were to bring home to Palestine what remained of European Jewry after the Holocaust and to become an independent state. On May 14, 1948, Israel declared its independence, and all Arab countries retaliated by declaring war. I was then 11 years old, in the sixth grade of elementary school. My interest in biology began a few years later. Playing hooky from school, I would spend many hours in the field or at the Tel Aviv Biological-Pedagogical Institution. Fortunately, our headmaster (whom I remember with much love and appreciation), a broad-minded and great pedagogue, tolerated my truancy.

On 1955, after finishing high school, I served for three years in the Israel Defense Forces. The army was no picnic, especially during the 1956 Sinai War. After my release, I decided to study biology. Because I could not afford to study at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, the only recognized university in Israel in those days, I decided to start at the small, as yet unrecognized Tel Aviv University (which in time became the largest one in Israel). The Dean of Life Sciences there was Dr. Heinrich Mendelssohn, a renowned ethologist (and founder of modern zoology in Israel) who had previously headed the Tel Aviv Biological-Pedagogical Institution where I had spent so many pleasurable "truant" days.

I finished my B.Sc. and did my M.Sc. in Entomology. My thesis was on the biology and behavior of a parasitic wasp. This, as well as Lorenz's and Tinbergen's prevalent studies and concepts, drew my interest toward the neuronal mechanisms underlying animal behavior. Neurobiology in Israel was then in its infancy, and there was nowhere for me to continue my Ph.D. studies in this field. I ended up, in 1965, at the Hebrew University School of Medicine in Jerusalem. My mentor was Professor J. Magnes (in many respects the founder of neurobiology in Israel), and my thesis focused upon cortico-cortical connections of the pyramidal tract in the cat, not exactly the subject I had dreamed of. However, it was a start. In June 1967, the Six-Day War broke out and I was mobilized for several quite "uneasy" weeks, despite the great victory of the Israeli army.

I graduated in January 1970, and shortly after I went to the NIH as a post-doc. I was supposed to work with Dr. Phillip Nelson on auditory physiology. On my arrival, however, I discovered that Phil had switched from audition to neuroblastoma cells. Together with another post-doc, John Newman, I was assigned to continue a study initiated by a previous post-doc, Peter Winter, an ex-student of Dr. Detlev Ploog. Peter, together with a young physician who was on a temporary assignment at the NIH, recorded cellular responses from the auditory cortex of awake squirrel monkeys to species-specific vocalizations. Their approach was novel in the sense that most auditory physiologists routinely used simple auditory stimuli. The common view was that by analyzing the response properties to simple stimuli, the mechanisms by which complex sounds are encoded would be understood as well. Their pioneering study yielded interesting results. However, they finished their formal training at the NIH before they managed to publish, and Peter went back to Germany. At this stage, John and I, quite inexperienced in the field, had to step in. Luckily, Peter briefly returned to the NIH and helped us with the first steps. The results of our joint effort were presented in a workshop held in Baltimore in June 1971.

Meeting Peter had a very meaningful impact on my personal life. For obvious reasons, I had avoided, until then, any contact with Germans. Having to work with him, I found myself in an impossible but unavoidable situation. It was very difficult for both of us. However, after a while, but not before we had held some painful dialogues on Jewish-German relations, the ice was broken. I discovered in Peter a very thoughtful, open-minded, and sensitive person. Not only could we work together, but we became very close friends, as did our families. Tragically, shortly after he returned home, Peter was killed in a snow avalanche. This brought to an end our very unique relationship and common plans for the future.

In October 1971, I presented our results at the first meeting of the SFN. Our main message was that species-specific communication sounds are detected in the auditory cortex of awake squirrel monkeys by highly specific cells. We also showed that the frequency range over which such cells respond to pure tone bursts does not readily predict the responses to these vocalizations. Fitting nicely into the contemporary popular concept of "pontifical" cells, our results were well accepted and published in Science magazine and other scientific journals.

In 1972, I obtained a position at Tel Aviv University. Intending to proceed with the same project, I needed to build from scratch an experimental setup and to establish a squirrel monkey colony, which took me almost a year. Then, on Yom Kippur, October 1973, another very traumatic war broke out, and I was mobilized for seven months. Having seen all-too-active service, a few more months passed before I had completely recovered, emotionally and physically. Eventually, I started to run experiments investigating the mode by which cells respond to normal and reversed vocalizations and to natural sequences of vocalizations, how non-primary auditory areas respond to these vocalizations, and the nature of the thalamo-cortico transformation. We also formulated a mathematical model predicting how medial geniculate cells respond to species-specific vocalizations.

Our unexpected findings that cells may change their selectivity during repeated exposure of the monkey to the same vocalizations led us to modify our concept regarding call detection. Our modified suggestion was that vocalizations are presented in the brain by spatiotemporal activity of dynamic cell assemblies rather than by specific "call detectors." This was in 1979, and we had a very hard time publishing this novel idea. Needless to say, nowadays this has became a common concept. I was invited to present these results at the first ISN Congress in Tokyo in 1986.

Frustrated somewhat by our inability to formulate critical experiments that could explicitly either prove or reject our ideas, I was attracted by a completely different subject, the subterranean blind mole rat. A look at its sectioned brain (by my wife Miriam, a biologist in her own right) revealed that despite its blindness, it still possesses the main typical visual centers. Bothered by the question of what these structures do in a blind animal, I initiated a new line of experiments. Applying (with H. Scheich and students) electrophysiological, structural, 2-deoxyglucose, and projection tracing procedures, we demonstrated that the thalamic and cortical visual areas in this congenitally blind animal are activated by auditory input; that this takeover occurs during the first weeks of postnatal development; and that the source of the auditory input to these visual areas is the mesencephalic auditory nucleus. Motivated by these findings, we sought a similar cross-modal neuroplasticity in the brain of visually impaired hamsters. Our preliminary findings are very promising, and in collaboration with Drs. Rickye and Henry Heffner, we are now testing behaviorally whether this is also manifested in a superior hearing capability.

I have briefly described my two major fields of research. However, "in between" I have also investigated various aspects of: Aplysia circadian rhythm (with H. Gainer), insect oocytes membrane properties, hedgehog auditory cortex (with B. Masterton), blind mole rat seismic communication (with J. Terkel and R. Rado), and the fascinating properties of the sarafo-toxin/endo-thelin isopeptides families (with E. Kochva and A. Bdolah).

Now, at the age of 61, father of two daughters and grandfather of two grandchildren, I feel fortunate and grateful for the opportunity I have had to be able do what I love, to attend many interesting meetings throughout the world, and to meet so many fascinating people.

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AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

Dr. Michael Land
University of Sussex, England
M.F.Land@sussex.ac.uk

My interest in biology seems to have come from a childish desire to collect, which in my case took the form of squashing half the British flora. By my midteens the immobility of plants began to bore me, and I switched to zoology when I went to Cambridge. In those days (ca. 1960), the sex ratio in Cambridge was so dire as to preclude normal life, but the resulting monastic existence did mean I got a decent degree. Among my teachers there I would single out Carl Pantin, the Professor of Zoology. His course on the invertebrates, a mixture of taxonomy, anatomy, physiology, ecology and behavior, left me with a life-long enthusiasm for the seafood end of the animal kingdom. It helped that there was a good museum in the department, where I developed a kind of nineteenth century naturalist's fascination for the more bizarre products of natural selection.

After Cambridge, I went to do a PhD at University College London where I worked on the eyes of scallops and finally enjoyed some female company. I had persuaded my supervisor, John Gray (later to become secretary of the Medical Research Council and ultimately Sir John) that scallops had a nice ganglion that all these eyes fed into, and a clear, if dull, behavior (shutting) and that this ganglion clearly needed its input/output relationships sorted out. In fact I didn't get past the eye. Quite early on, I made a chance observation that when one looks into a scallop's eye, one sees an inverted image of oneself. At first I thought, fine, all eyes have images, but then in eyes like ours the image, as viewed through the lens isn't in the eye itself but back where the object was, somewhere near infinity. Scallops' eyes turned out to be unique; the image was indeed not formed by a lens but by the reflecting mirror that lined the back. This was a great stroke of luck. A nicely identifiable discovery that made me think "hey, I can do this science stuff," and I haven't really looked back.

After London, I went to Berkeley on a Miller Fellowship sponsored by Gerald Westheimer, who taught me about eye movements and magic optical arrangements such as the Maxwellian view, and Dick Eakin, who by then had looked at the ultrastructure of the eyes of just about everything. As the Chinese curse has it: "May you live in interesting times." Berkeley in the late 1960s was certainly interesting. We had Eldridge Cleaver and the Black Panthers, People's Park, the Alameda County Sherriff's deputies, and, finally, the National Guard, with the Vietnam War in the background as the engine for much of the unrest. At the same time, there was a wonderful gathering of eye people. Apart from my sponsors, Horace Barlow, Jack Pettigrew, Colin Blakemore, and Bill Levick were there as were Barry Frost, Ron Hoy, and several other human physiologists. After one or two false starts, I decided to work on jumping spiders, inspired by some remarkable work on their vision by Heinrich Homann in the 1920s, and set about collecting them by bashing branches of trees into an umbrella, earning me a reputation as a harmless lunatic. Jumping spiders have movable principal eyes, and my most interesting discovery from that era was that when a spider sees a small moving target, the eyes go into a very repeatable scanning routine involving both side-to-side and torsional movements of the retina. At least one function of this scanning routine was suggested already: it permitted the spider to make the distinction between objects that were edible and others that it would be more appropriate to mate.. Oscar Drees had shown in the 1950s that spiders really like legs: enough legs at the right angle and a male jumping spider will start his highland fling-like mating dance.

I returned to England in 1971, to a temporary post at the University of Sussex, a new and attractive campus that had managed to get most of its buildings completed before the money ran out in the mid-1970s. My first collaborations were with Tom Collett on the ways flies chase each other, based on the observation that flies under lampshades seemed to go in for small-scale Snoopy and Red Baron dog-fights, and if this were the case, there would have to be appropriate control systems involved (I had earlier read some of Horst Mittelstaedt's papers and become quite interested in control theory). Switching from houseflies to hoverflies, Tom and I were particularly impressed by the similarities of some hoverfly behaviors to human eye movements, the saccades, tracking, optokinetic stabilizing, etc., except, of course, that these were brought about by flight maneuvers not eye muscles. The thought that much behavior, especially in insects, is to be explained as subserving the active uptake of visual information is an idea that has remained with me ever since. Tom and I also looked at visual memory in hoverflies, and he developed ideas that were to lead to the celebrated "snapshot model" of bee landmark memory that he and Brian Cartwright developed in 1982.

Meanwhile, I had deserted behavior temporarily and returned to optics. I was lucky enough to have a friend, Peter Herring, who organized deep-sea cruises on the RRS Discovery, and I went on four of these altogether. In 1975, I found that shrimp eyes work on a mirror mechanism in which an array of corner reflector boxes, at right angles to the cornea, form a superposition image on the retina. Later, I found out that I was only the belated codiscoverer of this system; Klaus Vogt, then in Tuebingen, had found the same mechanism in crayfish the year before. Still, by then, I had already had my celebratory drink! Subsequently, this mechanism turned out to be useful for focusing X-rays (for telescopes) and collimating them (for submicron circuit etching). It was satisfying to see biology leading engineering for a change. There were many other good things in the sea: the spectacular double eyes of hyperiid amphipods and euphausiids, the scanning eyes of heteropod mollusks, and the strange eyes of pontellid copepods, each using a different optical principle. Sadly, going to sea now involves a lengthy bureaucratic hassle; in the old days, Peter simply called me on the phone.

In the early 1980s Sussex University had a Thatcher-induced financial crisis. Anyone who could remove themselves from the payroll for a couple of years was regarded as a hero. Luckily, this coincided with my getting a two-year fellowship at the Australian National University in Canberra where, once again, there was a remarkable coincidence of interesting eye people including Simon Laughlin, Dan-Eric Nilsson, Daniel Osorio, Joe Howard, David Blest, Eldon Ball, and, not least my host, Adrian Horridge. A number of us tried to sort out the optics of butterfly eyes, the issue being that butterflies have apposition eyes, but their close relatives the moths mostly have superposition eyes. How could the one type evolve into the other? Dan Nilsson cracked this by discovering in the bottom of the butterfly crystalline cone a tiny lens of immense power (0.2 megadiopters!), which brought the butterfly and moth structures into line anatomically but provided the former with apposition-like optics.

After I returned to England, I had a new research student, Justin Marshall, who shared my enthusiasm for mantis shrimps; vicious crustaceans with amazing eyes. Within a year or so, he had discovered, with Tom Cronin, that mantis shrimp have a color-vision system based on eight visual pigments, now extended to 12 because it transpires that they have another four in the ultraviolet. They have funny eye movements too, which is where I came in, but it is the color vision that is so astonishing.

Since about 1990, much of my research has been on human eye movements. About that time, I invented a video-based, head-mounted eye movement monitor that left the wearer completely free to do ordinary things. The secret was to leave the computation of eye direction until after the activity was finished, thereby making the device itself very light. So far, we have used this system to study driving, playing ball games, and sight-reading music. Our ethological colleagues would like to take it to a disco to study mate choice, but so far we have resisted this. The questions of interest revolve around the way we sample the world, given that our region of acute vision is only about 1 across. Where do we need to look to get the information we need to do things? Answers are emerging, but we get into trouble with some of our psychologist colleagues. "But this is only curiosity driven, they say; where are the hypotheses?" The trouble with being hypothesis driven is that you never get to make a discovery. And that's the real buzz.

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MEMBERSHIP IN ISN

You can obtain a membership form to join ISN or update your membership information at the ISN Website. Please encourage colleagues to consider joining ISN.

MATERIAL FOR FUTURE NEWSLETTERS

Send news, job advertisements, meeting announcements and other related information for the next newsletter (to be published in early March) to Arthur Popper at: ap17@umail.umd.edu. All material should be sent via E-mail.

Advertisements for jobs and graduate/postdoctoral positions should be no more than 150 words. Suggestions for feature articles, including autobiographical sketches, research group reports, and Neuroethological Viewpoints, should also be sent to Art Popper. However, please do not submit full articles of this type without a response from the Editorial Board. Feature articles may be up to 1,500 words in length. We also welcome research commentaries, book reviews, and other material that might be of interest to the ISN community. These should be no longer than 450 words in length, and should only submitted after consultation with the editor.

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Courses, Meetings, and Workshops

The ANIMAL BEHAVIOR SOCIETY ANNUAL MEETING will be held 26 June 1 July 1999 at Bucknell Univ. in Lewisburg, PA. Plenary speakers include Gail Michener, Lynne Houck, and Steve Nowicki. Symposia include "Educating about Animal Behavior: A Broader Perspective." For information see //www.cisab.indiana.edu/ABS/index.html or contact local host, Michael Pereira [mpereira@bucknell.edu, (717) 524 1430].

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Positions

FACULTY POSITIONS

SYSTEMS NEUROBIOLOGY OR COMPUTATIONAL NEUROSCIENCE, Cornell Univ., The Section of Neurobiology and Behavior invites applications for a tenure-track position at the ASSISTANT PROFESSOR level. Applicants must have a Ph.D., an excellent record of scientific productivity, and a commitment to undergraduate and graduate teaching. Candidates should have research interests in neuroethology with expertise in one or more of the following areas: sensory or motor systems, evolutionary neurobiology, neural modeling. Send Curriculum Vitae, Statement of Research Interests, Statement of Teaching Interests, up to three publications, and three letters of reference to: Chair, Search Committee, Section of Neurobiology and Behavior, Cornell Univ., Ithaca, NY 14853-2702. Review of applications begins December 1, 1998. Women and minority candidates are strongly encouraged to apply. Cornell University is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer.

BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE UNIV. OF WASHINGTON Two tenure track faculty positions at the assistant professor level. Successful candidates will be expected to employ a range of modern neuroscience techniques and integrate neural and behavioral approaches. Areas of particular interest include, but are not limited to, learning and memory, neuroethology, plasticity, and sensory systems. Applicants must have a strong record of published research and will be expected to participate actively in undergraduate and graduate teaching. Ph.D. is required by date of appointment. To apply, send a complete curriculum vitae, statement of research and teaching interests, 3 5 reprints, and arrange to have three letters of recommendation sent to: Behavioral Neuroscience Search Committee, Dept. of Psychology, Univ. of Washington, Box 351525, Seattle, WA 98195 1525. Priority will be given to applications received before December 1, 1998. The Univ. of Washington is building a culturally diverse faculty and strongly encourages applications from women and minority candidates. The Univ. is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer.

The Dept. of Psychology at The Univ. of Illinois at Chicago invites applications for a tenure track faculty appointment at the Assistant Professor level, beginning Fall 1999. Applicants must have a Ph.D. and an active research program in BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE employing animal models, with an emphasis on central mechanisms. The successful applicant will also contribute to The Laboratory of Integrative Neuroscience (LIN), a unit of the UIC College of Liberal Arts & Sciences that involves 14 neuroscience faculty from three Departments (Psychology, Biological Sciences, and Philosophy). For more information see the Biopsychology Website www.uic.edu/depts/psch/biopsych.html. Submit letter of application, curriculum vitae, statements of research and teaching interests, and 3 letters of reference to Dr. Michael W. Levine, Chair, Neuroscience Search Committee, c/o Robert Canavan, Dept. of Psychology (M/C 285), The Univ. of Illinois at Chicago, 1007 W. Harrison St., Chicago, IL 60607 7137. For full consideration submit by Dec. 31, 1998. UIC is an equal opportunity affirmative action employer.

CELL/MOLECULAR BIOLOGIST. The Dept. of Zoology, Univ. of Oklahoma, has a tenure track Assistant Professor position for Fall, 1999. Teaching will be one course/semester, periodically including cell biology. Candidates must have: (1) proven record of good teaching, (2) demonstrated ability to conduct significant independent research, and (3) Ph.D degree. Postdoctoral experience is preferred. Send CV, reprints of published papers, statements of research interests and teaching experience, and four letters of recommendation to: James N. Thompson, jr., Chair, Dept. of Zoology, Univ. of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019 USA. Tel: (405) 325 4821; Fax: (405) 325 6202; E mail: zoology@ou.edu. Additional details are available on the Zoology web page: http://www.ou.edu/cas/zoology/. Screening of candidates will begin 11 January 1999 and continue until the position is filled. OU is an AAE/EEO employer and has a policy of being responsive to the needs of dual career couples. Women and minorities are encouraged to apply.

The Dept. of Psychology at the Univ.of Pennsylvania intends to hire a tenure track assistant professor in the area of BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE. We are especially interested in individuals whose research integrates behavioral and systems neurobiological approaches in animal models. Research areas of particular interest include, but are not limited to, neural mechanisms of sensory perception, learning and memory, neural plasticity, the control of motor systems, appetitive behavior, addiction, emotion, and stress. In addition to assessment of behavior, research methodology may include electrophysiology, molecular biology, genetics or pharmacology. The successful applicant must demonstrate the capacity to establish a vigorous research program and a commitment to both graduate and undergraduate education. Please provide a CV including the names, addresses (including e mail, fax, and telephone) of four references, a statement of research and teaching interests. Send materials to: Behavioral Neuroscience Search, Dept. of Psychology, Univ. of Pennsylvania, 3815 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104 by December 1, 1998.

The Neuroscience and Cognitive Science Program (NACS) at the Univ. of Maryland, seeks a tenure-track faculty member with research interests in COMPUTATIONAL NEUROSCIENCE. Areas of research include sensory and motor physiology, analysis of control systems and cognitive neuroscience. A wide range of techniques can be supported, from neural network modeling to brain mapping/imaging/EEG. Candidates who integrate theoretical with experimental research are preferred. Tenure will be held in the Depts of Psychology or Kinesiology. Teaching duties include a graduate course in computational neuroscience and undergraduate course(s) designated by the home department. Details may be found at (http://www.life.umd.edu/NACS/). For appointment in Psychology, the rank will be Assistant Professor. For Kinesiology, rank is open. Send a C.V., names, addresses and E-mail of three possible references, and statements of research interests and of teaching interests to: Dr. Richard Payne, NACS Search, Neuroscience and Cognitive Science Program, 2239 Zool/Psych Building, Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742. UM is an equal opportunity affirmative action employer.

GRADUATE AND POSTGRADUATE

NEUROSCIENCES GRADUATE PROGRAM: The Australian National University (Canberra) offers a multi disciplinary program in Neuroscience with unique coverage from the cell biology & neurophysiology to animal behavior, human psychophysics and computational neuroscience. The courses provide advanced research training in an environment of some 100 full time research staff, offering access to world class facilities, such as excellent laboratory equipment, state of the art computing resources, and comprehensive libraries. Neuroscience activities at the ANU are very broad and often multi disciplinary, with a particularly strong interest in the neuroethology of auditory and visual systems. A variety of courses (Grad.Dip.Sc., M.Sc., Ph.D.), offered jointly by the Faculty of Science and Institute of Advanced Studies, is managed by the Graduate School. A number of competitive scholarships are available. Students may also enquire about workshops and laboratory work experience schemes held during holidays. The Graduate School and Students' Association offer a wide range of Student Services, and the University provides assistance with accommodation. further information: Johannes Zanker, neuroscience.convenor@anu.edu.edu, http://www.anu.edu.au/academia/programs/n1

Postdoctoral Position in NEUROBIOLOGY. A postdoctoral position (BAT IIa) is immediately available at the Lehrstuhl fuer Zoologie/Tierphysiologie of the RWTH Aachen. It is expected that the successful candidate develops her or his research program in the field of "acoustic motion detection" within the newly formed Schwerpunktprogramm of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft "Zeitgebundene Verarbeitung im zentralen akustischen System" (see our home page (http://birdland.bio2.rwth aachen.de). The research should include a combination of neurophysiological and theoretical projects. At the moment, financial support for two years is available, but this period may be extended to 6 years with the possibility of submitting a Habilitation. Send inquiries and applications with CV, two letters of reference and relevant reprints to Prof. Dr. Hermann Wagner, Lehrstuhl fuer Zoologie/Tierphysiologie, RWTH Aachen, D 52074 Aachen, Kopernikusstrasse 16, Tel. +49 (0)241 804835, Fax: +49 (0)241 8888133, e mail: wagner@tyto.bio2.rwth aachen.de

NIH funded postdoctoral position available at the Univ. of Maryland to study AUDITORY INFORMATION PROCESSING, spatial perception, and sensorimotor integration, using the echolocating bat as a model system. Current research projects focus on the perceptual and neural mechanisms supporting spatially guided behavior, and our newest experiments involve extracellular recordings in the awake, behaving bat. Laboratory facilities include a large flight room for behavioral studies, extracellular recording and microstimulation booth, ultrasound recording and playback systems, high speed digital video cameras, surgery and histology rooms. We participate in the Comparative and Evolutionary Biology of Hearing Training Program at UM, and possibilities exist for collaborative research with other auditory neuroethology laboratories. Background in extracellular recording and/or neuroanatomical techniques preferred. For more information see: www.bsos.umd.edu/psyc/batlab. Send CV, statement of research interests and names of three references to Cynthia Moss, Dept. of Psychology, Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, or by E-mail tocmoss@bss3.umd.edu.

POSTDOCTORAL POSITION available immediately to study the neuronal and genetic basis of behavior in the nematode C. elegans. Cell attached, whole cell, and perforated patch recordings will be used to analyze biophysical properties of identified neurons contributing to normal and mutant behaviors. Patch clamp experience is preferred. Please send CV and names of three references to: Dr. S.R. Lockery, Institute of Neuroscience, 1254 University of Oregon, Eugene, OR 97403. The University of Oregon is an AA/EO institution committed to cultural diversity and compliance with ADA.

5 year Postdoc position in DEVELOPMENTAL NEUROBIOLOGY (BAT Iia). Our group does research on neurobiology and neuroendocrinology of arthropods. We are particularly interested in the morphology, physiology and ontogeny of neuroendocrine cells in insects and crustaceans. We are looking for a person to complement our skills and interests in both research and teaching. Candidates should have a strong independent research project as well as strong motivation for teaching undergraduate and graduate students. To strengthen our group, we prefer candidates with interests in developmental neurobiology, but persons with other research interests in developmental biology are welcome to apply. Knowledge in biochemical and/or molecular techniques would be most welcome. Please send applications including CV and names of at least two references to: Prof. Dr. Peter Br?unig, Abteilung f. Morphologie und Entwicklungsbiologie der Tiere, Institut f6r Biologie II (Zoologie) der RWTH, Kopernikusstrasse 16,52074 Aachen, Germany. Phone: 0241 80 4838, Fax: 0241 8888 133, E mail: braeunig@bio2.rwth aachen.de

The BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE faculty in the Dept. of Zoology at the Univ. of Oklahoma anticipate several openings for graduate studies leading to the degrees of M.S. and Ph.D. in Zoology. Assistantships up to $15,000 and full tuition waivers are available competitively. An excellent scientific environment for study in the behavioral neurosciences exists at the University. The Zoology Dept. has strong research groups in physiology, animal behavior and ecology. A variety of graduate level courses are offered in neurosciences and related fields, such as: Introduction to Neuroscience, Sensorimotor Integration, Physiological Bases of Animal Behavior, Comparative Neurophysiology, Neurobehavioral Development, Sensory Functions, Molecular Biology, Seminar in Sensory Physiology, Endocrine Physiology, Neurobiology of Memory, as well as special topic courses. Numerous additional neuroscience courses are also offered through the Oklahoma Center for Neurosciences, a multi departmental program. For more information, contact us at one of these addresses: Dept. of Zoology, Univ. of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019 0235; http://www.ou.edu/cas/zoology; zoology@ou.edu

ENGINEER POSITION: BioMimetic cybernetics. Position for an engineer or person with appropriate skill and experience to join the robolobster team. Required skills: embedded systems, control theory, electro mechanical interface design, programming in C. Desirable skills: familiarity with fluid dynamics, aqueous sensing, computational ethology, neuroethology. Available immediately in the Atema Lab, Boston University Marine Program. Term, 1 year with continuation contingent on available funds. For further information contact: Frank W. Grasso, BUMP, MBL, Woods Hole, MA 02543, fgrasso@hoh.mbl.edu, FAX 548 2795

Post Doctoral Position in INTEGRATIVE NEUROBIOLOGY AND BEHAVIOR. Applications are invited for a post doctoral position in Integrative Neurobiology and Behavior in the Section of Neurobiology and Behavior at Cornell University. The position is funded by a training grant from the National Institute of Mental Health. Applicants are expected to develop a strong research project in conjunction with one or more of the training faculty, all of whom are in the in the field of neuroethology, cellular neurobiology, or behavioral biology. For more information, contact Carl D. Hopkins, Program Director, NIMH Training Grant, 263 Mudd Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853. E-mail CDH8@cornell.edu

Postdoctoral Position available to study the NEURAL BASIS FOR GUSTATORY CONTROL OF FEEDING. In goldfish, the brainstem circuitry linking gustatory input to patterned motor control of the palate and pharynx is amenable to both in vivo and in vitro physiological approaches to study neurotransmitters and functional connectivity. (Finger, 1997 [Acta Phys. Scand. 161, Suppl. 638: 59 66]). Applicants should have experience in electrophysiology and can receive training in immunocytochemistry, ligand binding, in situ hybridization and other methods appropriate to analyze the system. Interested applicants should send a C.V., a brief statement of current and future research interests, and the names and phone numbers of three references to: Dr. Thomas Finger, Dept. C&S Biology, Univ. Colorado Medical School, Denver CO 80262, or E-mail: Tom.Finger@UCHSC.edu. AA/EOE.

Postdoctoral position available to study ULTRASOUND DETECTION BY FISH. Current studies in the lab include physiological, behavioral, and anatomical analysis of the mechanism used by clupeid fish to detect signals to above 180 kHz . We seek someone to primarily be involved in physiological analysis of inner ear function, but that person would also have opportunities to participate in the other aspects of this investigation. Our program is part of the larger Comparative and Evolutionary Biology of Hearing group at the Univ. of Maryland, and so the selected individual would be able to interact with research groups studying diverse animal groups using a wide range of approaches to the study of hearing. Send a letter of interest, CV, and names and E-mail addresses of three references to: Dr. Arthur N. Popper, Dept. of Biology, Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742 USA. Phone (301) 405-1940; fax: (301) 314-9358; E-mail ap17@umail.umd.edu. //www.life.umd.edu/biology/popperlab.

Post doctoral position to study HEARING AND VOCAL LEARNING IN BIRDS at the Univ. of Maryland. Current studies in the lab include operant control of vocal behavior in budgerigars, the perception of natural and synthetic vocalizations, and the perception of complex sounds designed to reveal mechanisms of cochlear function. We seek someone to be involved in all aspects of acoustic communication in birds but with a primary interest in either vocal production, perception, or the anatomical foundations of vocal learning in birds. Our program is part of the larger Comparative and Evolutionary Biology of Hearing group at the Univ. of Maryland, and so the selected individual would be able to interact with research groups studying diverse animal groups using a wide range of approaches to the study of hearing. Send a letter of interest, CV, and names and E mail addresses of three references to: Dr. Robert J. Dooling, Dept. of Psychology, Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742 USA. Phone (301) 405 5925; fax: (301) 314 9566; E mail dooling@bss3.umd.edu

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