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The goal of my research is to characterize the cellular mechanisms that contribute to sensory transduction and signal processing in the nervous system. My current experiments address the conductances underlying electrical resonance and its modulation in hair cells in the turtle auditory and vestibular systems. These hair cells are relatively undifferentiated, and a single cell type serves as both resonant detector of mechanical displacement, and target of efferent control. By understanding how frequency selectivity is achieved in reptiles, we can assess the applicability of these mechanisms to hearing in higher vertebrates, including man. Though there are a number of physiological and anatomical differences across vertebrates, some cellular processes may be quite general. For example, using turtle hair cells as a model, an increase in body temperature and a modest increase in conductance yield cells that resonate at the limits of human hearing.
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