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Short Protocols in Neuroscience: Systems and Behavioral Methods
John Wiley and Sons Ltd, Jan 2007, Pages: 610
As recently as 25 years ago, a wide technical gulf separated neuroscience from the rest of biology. To address the complex anatomy and unusual physiological properties of neurons, neurobiologists (a term not then in vogue) used highly specialized techniques of anatomical tracing and electrophysiological analysis that were foreign to most biologists. Conversely, many neurobiologists, absorbed in their own disciplines, were insulated from the ideas and techniques in common use elsewhere in biology. Twenty-five years later the technical landscape of neurobiology is vastly different. The specialized features of neurons are now recognized as variations on fundamental biological processes shared by all cells. Axonal transport and neurotransmitter release, for example, are now known to occur by mechanisms that are related to those of membrane trafficking and secretion used by all eukaryotic cells, and the neurofilaments whose unusual staining properties allowed neuroanatomists to trace axonal tracts are now recognized as part of a larger family of intermediate filaments found in many cell types. The recognition of common themes in the biology of neurons and other cells has opened neuroscience to the wide range of techniques used in the study of other cell types. Of these, molecular biological approaches, in particular, have had an enormous impact on neurobiology. Immunological, genetic, cell culture, and cell imaging techniques have also enriched the repertoire of cellular neurobiologists. In the meantime, innovations in biophysics have allowed the electrical properties of cells to be studied at the level of single channels. Methods for preserving brain microcircuitry through the use of brain slices have allowed the complex organization of the mammalian brain to be studied at the cellular level. Finally, the techniques used by neurobiologists have been amplified by our increasing ability to study the biological bases of behavior. These exciting developments have posed a considerable challenge to neurobiologists in that the array of relevant technologies for study of the nervous system is arguably broader than for biologists in any other field. In a single experiment, laboratories may attempt to relate results obtained with molecular, cellular, anatomical, and behavioral techniques. The demand for technical versatility is met in part through increased collaborations between laboratories and in part by broad training among neuroscientists. The contemporary pace of discovery and of technical innovation is such, however, that all of us are continually learning new techniques, either as practitioners or as knowledgeable collaborators.
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