Robert C. Eaton

Integrative Physiology; Member of the Center for Neuroscience

Integrative Physiology,
University of Colorado at Boulder
Boulder, CO 80309-0334

email: reaton@indra.com
Phone: 720-304-2641
Website: none

Professor Eaton received his Ph.D. in biology from the University of California, Riverside in 1974. He was an Assistant Research Neuroscientist at the University of California, San Diego. He received a National Research Service Award from the N.I.H. and also an I.N.S.E.R.M. fellowship to do post-doctoral work at University of Paris. He joined the faculty of the Department of E.P.O. Biology in 1977 as Assistant Professor. He received a Faculty Fellowship in 1988 and has served as a Visiting Scholar at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography (U.C.S.D.). He is a former Chair of E.P.O. Biology, and has been a member of the Integrative, Functional and Cognitive Neuroscience (5) study section at N.I.H. He has been active in the International Society for Neuroethology, and has been its Treasurer. His research interests concern the neurophysiological mechanisms of sensorimotor integration. For this purpose he has used the Mauthner neuron system of fishes as an experimental model. Previous work was on the neural mechanisms and kinematics of Mauthner-initiated escape movements. Current projects involve both experiments and computer simulations (GENESIS) to determine how the Mauthner neuron lateral dendrite computes the direction of underwater sounds. Such non-linear processes are important in neural network computations. Current grant support is from the National Science Foundation: "Cellular Mechanisms of Directional Sound Localization by a Brain Stem Network," with J.L. Casagrand and "Computational Neurobiology at the Cellular Level " with Prof. J. S. Fox of the Mathematics Department.

Selected Publications:

Eaton, R.C., Casagrand, J.L. and Cummins, G.I. (2002) Neural implementation of the phase model for localising impulse sounds by the Mauthner system. Bioacoustics (in press).

Eaton, R.C., Lee, R. K. K. & Foreman, M.B., (2001) The Mauthner cell and other identified neurons of the brainstem escape network of fish, Progress in Neurobiology 63:467-485.

Casagrand, J.L. Guzik, A. L., Eaton, R.C. (1999) Mauthner and reticulospinal responses to the onset of acoustic pressure and acceleration stimuli. J. Neurophysiology 82:1422-1437.