Neural Circuits of Innate Behaviors

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-ix

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2. Neural Circuits Underlying Innate Fear

   • Chaoran Ren, Qian Tao

   Pages 1-7

3. Neurobiology and Neural Circuits of Aggression

   • Mohamed Helmy, Jiaozhen Zhang, Hao Wang

   Pages 9-22

4. Neural Regulation of Feeding Behavior

   • Sijia Hao, Yiwen Yang, Mohamed Helmy, Hao Wang

   Pages 23-33

5. Neural Circuits for Reward

   • Wen Zhang

   Pages 35-41

6. Neuronal Response and Behavioral Modulation in Social Interactions

   • Yang Zhan

   Pages 43-48

7. Neural Circuit Mechanisms That Underlie Parental Care

   • Zi-Xian Yu, Xing-Yu Li, Xiao-Hong Xu

   Pages 49-62

8. Spatial Navigation

   • Wenjun Jin, Han Qin, Kuan Zhang, Xiaowei Chen

   Pages 63-90

9. Neural Circuits for Sleep–Wake Regulation

   • Ying Wu, Lieju Wang, Fen Yang, Wang Xi

   Pages 91-112

This book summarizes the latest research findings in the neurocircuitry of innate behaviors, covering major topics such as innate fear, aggression, feeding, reward, social interaction, parental care, spatial navigation, and sleep-wake regulation. For decades, humans have been fascinated by wild animals’ instincts, like the annual two-thousand-mile migration of the monarch butterfly in North American, and the “imprint” behavior of newborn birds. Since these instincts are always displayed in stereotypical patterns in most individuals of a given species, the neural circuits processing such behaviors must be genetically hard-wired in the brain. Recently, with the development of modern techniques, including optogenetics, retrograde and anterograde virus tracing, and in vivo calcium imaging, researchers have been able to determine and dissect the specific neural circuits for many innate behaviors by selectively manipulating well-defined cell types in the brain. This book discusses recent advances in the investigation of the neural-circuit mechanisms underlying innate behaviors.

• Neural circuits
• Innate behavior
• Optogenetics
• Neuroscience
• Survival instincts

• Department of Neurobiology, Key Laboratory for Biomedical Engineering of Education Ministry, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzhou, China

  Hao Wang

Dr. Hao Wang is a Distinguished Professor and Principle Investigator at the Institute of Neuroscience, Zhejiang University School of Medicine. He received a Cheung Kong Scholars’ award from the Chinese Ministry of Education (Youth Program) in 2016. His research focuses on neural mechanisms of innate behaviors, and he has published several papers in leading journals in this field, such as Nature Neuroscience, Cell Reports, eLife and the Journal of Neuroscience.

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