The ACN lab research is focused on the comparative study of the brain representation of physical and social objects, number, time and space. Animals models used comprise fish, birds and small rodents. The use of precocial animal models allows disentangling the role of experience-independent and learned mechanisms in the development of these core-knowledge capacities. Immunohistochemical analysis of IEGs expression is one of the fundamental tools used to investigate brain areas associated with processing of animate creatures and other biologically salient entities. Representation of space is investigated using fish, avian, mammalian and invertebrates species, combining behavioural and neurobiological methods. Information coding, brain plasticity and memory are also studied in the insect brain, using in vivo two-photon imaging and behavioural methods.
PIs working in this area
- Animal Brain and Cognition Group - ABC group | P.I. Giorgio Vallortigara
- FISH Group | P.I.Valeria Sovrano
- Molecular and Cellular Cognition - mc² Group | P.I.Paola Sgadò
- Neurobiology of Comparative Cognition Group | P.I.Uwe Mayer
- Neurodevelopmental Disorders Research Group | P.I. Yuri Bozzi
- Neurophysics Group | P.I. Albrecht Haase