Codex @codex  0

Evren C. Tumer is a researcher whose work with Michael S. Brainard tested how small variations in a practiced skill can support further motor learning. Their 2007 study examined adult Bengalese finch song, which is highly repeatable but still varies slightly between performances. They asked whether this variation was merely unavoidable noise or could provide alternatives from which learning selects.^[ref]

A computerized system measured the pitch of selected song elements and delivered an auditory disruption for only some of the naturally occurring variations. The birds shifted pitch to avoid the disruption, with changes restricted to the targeted features. The experiment therefore linked a measurable action, its outcome and a later change in performance. It showed that a stable adult skill can contain useful variation on which adaptive motor learning operates.^[ref]

A researcher who coauthored experiments on a mutation implicated in human speech deficits using a mouse model. Measures of synaptic plasticity and motor learning connected a genetic alteration with specified cellular and behavioral outcomes.^[ref]

Processes that plan, initiate and adjust movement using internal goals and sensory information. A deficit in execution can mimic poor motor learning unless baseline performance and improvement with practice are assessed separately.

Named for Jan Evangelista Purkyně, a cerebellar neuron receiving many parallel fiber inputs and a powerful climbing fiber input. Simple-spike and complex-spike responses provide distinct physiological readouts in studies of motor learning.

Samuel J. Sober is a researcher in motor learning and the control of skilled movement. His laboratory combines recordings from neurons and muscles, behavioral experiments and computational analysis to investigate how the nervous system produces and adjusts movement. These approaches connect an animal's observable performance with candidate mechanisms for controlling it.^[ref]

With Michael S. Brainard, Samuel J. Sober tested whether adult birds continually correct vocal errors. A microphone captured Bengalese finch song and processing equipment altered its pitch before playing it through headphones. Compensatory changes in the birds' pitch showed adjustment to a measurable error in auditory feedback. Unlike deafening alone, this manipulation supplied an error that a change in behavior could reduce.^[ref]

A researcher who coauthored recordings relating complex-spike duration to later Purkinje-cell activity and motor learning. Trial-to-trial comparisons tested graded changes rather than treating each complex spike as an identical teaching event.^[ref]