Monkeys heed neural calls of the wild.A part of the brain that's involved in sound processing shows pronounced activity when rhesus monkeys hear their comrades vocalizing but not when the same animals hear other sounds, a new brain-scan investigation finds. In human evolution, this call-oriented, left-hemisphere region served as a precursor of the left-brain structures that now contribute to speech understanding, propose Amy Poremba of the University of Iowa Not to be confused with Iowa State University. The first faculty offered instruction at the University in March 1855 to students in the Old Mechanics Building, situated where Seashore Hall is now. In September 1855, the student body numbered 124, of which, 41 were women. in Iowa City Iowa City, city (1990 pop. 59,738), seat of Johnson co., E Iowa, on both sides of the Iowa River; founded 1839 as the capital of Iowa Territory, inc. 1853. Among its manufactures are foam rubber, animal feed, paper, and food products. The city is the seat of the Univ. and her coworkers. The researchers used a positron emission tomography scanner Noun 1. positron emission tomography scanner - a tomograph that produces cross-sectional X-rays of metabolic processes in the body PET scanner tomograph - X-ray machine in which a computer builds a detailed image of a particular plane through an object from to measure glucose metabolism glucose metabolism, n the process by which simple sugars found in many foods are processed and used to produce energy in the form of ATP. Once consumed, glucose is absorbed by the intestines and into the blood. , a sign of neural activity, in the brains of eight monkeys. Measurements focused on two strips of tissue, one on each side of the brain, that regulate sound processing. During the scans, animals listened to recorded calls of other rhesus monkeys, including screams and barks. They also listened to recordings of people talking, water dripping, and other sounds unrelated to monkey communication. Only monkey calls elicited marked activity in the left-brain region, which handles information about sounds that has already been processed by adjacent acoustic tissue. Other sounds evoked particularly intense activity in right-brain areas. The findings appear in the Jan. 29 Nature. When a monkey hears another's call, auditory tissues on both sides of the brain react comparably to the sounds, but ensuing en·sue intr.v. en·sued, en·su·ing, en·sues 1. To follow as a consequence or result. See Synonyms at follow. 2. To take place subsequently. interactions between the hemispheres trigger the enhanced left-brain activity, Poremba's group theorizes. In support of that idea, three monkeys that had surgery to sever TO SEVER, practice. When defendants who are sued jointly have separate defences, they may in general sever, that is, each one rely on his own separate defence; each may plead severally and insist on his own separate plea. See Severance. the neural fibers that carry messages across the hemispheres displayed comparable left- and right-brain responses to monkey calls, rather than the left-brain emphasis, the scientists note.--B.B. |
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