Rudimentary substrates for vocal learning in a suboscine.
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2013
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Vocal learning has evolved in only a few groups of mammals and birds. The key neuroanatomical and behavioural links bridging vocal learners and non-learners are still unknown. Here we show that a non-vocal-learning suboscine, the eastern phoebe, expresses neural and behavioural substrates that are associated with vocal learning in closely related oscine songbirds. In phoebes, a specialized forebrain region in the intermediate arcopallium seems homologous to the oscine song nucleus RA (robust nucleus of arcopallium) by its neural connections, expression of glutamate receptors and singing-dependent immediate-early gene expression. Lesion of this RA-like region induces subtle but consistent song changes. Moreover, the unlearned phoebe song unexpectedly develops through a protracted ontogeny. These features provide the first evidence of forebrain vocal-motor control in suboscines, which has not been encountered in other avian non-vocal-learners, and offer a potential configuration of brain and behaviour from which vocal learning might have evolved.
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Liu, Wan-chun, Kazuhiro Wada, Erich D Jarvis and Fernando Nottebohm (2013). Rudimentary substrates for vocal learning in a suboscine. Nat Commun, 4. p. 2082. 10.1038/ncomms3082 Retrieved from https://hdl.handle.net/10161/11205.
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