The oculomotor and vestibular systems are two of the oldest and most thoroughly studied topics in systems neuroscience. The wealth and breadth of knowledge these systems offer produces progress at a rapid pace and in divergent directions, yielding a multidisciplinary view of oculomotor and vestibular functions in health and disease. It is increasingly apparent that a forum to forge interdisciplinary links among oculomotor and vestibular researchers would be of great benefit. This proposal requests support for a conference, whose objective is to bring together scientists and physicians of these mature fields to take a fresh look at how the diverse components of the oculomotor and vestibular systems interact and to stimulate increased interdisciplinary research. The proposed conference, entitled """"""""Advances in Oculomotor and Vestibular Systems,"""""""" is a satellite to the Annual Meeting of the Society for the Neural Control of Movement and will be held April 18-20, 2010, at the Naples Beach Hotel in Naples, Florida. The specific program will emphasize four emerging topics in oculomotor and/or vestibular systems. First, we will re-evaluate the actions of the superior colliculus. We will examine whether sensory signals are color-dependent (traditionally, they are assumed not to be) and visit the controversy of whether its motor command encodes the desired goal or the actual movement vector. Second, we will consider the role of the cortical and subcortical structures in visual cognition. Research that uses visual, oculomotor, and vestibular cues to gain insights into attention, target selection, and spatial orientation will be represented. Third, the framework of internal models has become another emerging topic. The oculomotor system is an ideal model system for the study of internal models because of the accurate response of eye movements and because of the insights that can be gained from perturbing them. The vestibular system has also shared the limelight with its use to study efference copy concepts. The cerebellum has been proposed as the locus of internal models, and studies that address this hypothesis will be emphasized. Finally, we will highlight the recent collaborative efforts of clinicians and computational scientists to simulate the pathophysiology of several ocular motility disorders. One uniqueness of the present approach has been to attribute the dysfunction to specific cell membrane properties, in contrast to the traditional view of a generic lesion to an oculomotor structure. In addition to the thematic sessions, scholarship recipients and other attendees will also have the opportunity to present posters of their research. Collectively, our objective is to create a scientifically vibrant atmosphere that brings together ideas and investigators that are often not at the same venue.
Disorders of oculomotor and vestibular systems include strabismus, nystagmus, vertigo, and postural imbalance. Contributions of these systems are reflected in motor control diseases (Parkinson's, torticollis), sensation syndromes (vertigo), and cognitive deficits (spatial neglect). Other disorders such as congenital fibrosis can also alter mechanistic properties of the extraocular muscle itself. Hence, the oculomotor and vestibular systems are of immense relevance to health.
