CWRU leaders and their graduate students in robotic design and functional electronic systems plan to tap the expertise of one of the world's leading pioneers in neuromechanics.

On April 7 and 8, Sten Grillner of the Nobel Institute of Neurophysiology in Sweden will share his understanding of how coordinated movement like swimming and running results from the interaction of nerve cells to produce action by many of muscles of the body.

He will give two free public lectures during his CWRU visit. Grillner's first talk, sponsored by the National Science Foundation-funded Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) Neuromechanics group at CWRU, takes place at 12:30 p.m. April 7 in 312 DeGrace Hall (the old Biology Building). He will address the topic, "An Experimental and Computational Analysis of the Neuronal Networks Underlying Locomotion: From Ion Channels to Neuromechanical Simulations."

His second talk, "The Intrinsic function of a Neuronal Network: From Ion Channels to Motor Behavior," is jointly sponsored by the Department of Neurosciences in the Medical School and the Department of Biology in Arts and Sciences. It begins at 4:15 p.m. April 8 in the Frohring Auditorium of the Biomedical Research Building.

Grillner studies the simplified nervous system of lamprey (in the same family as the exotic species invading Lake Erie). He explains that the interaction of the nerve cells and muscle in the lamprey can be applied to understanding the more complex human body. He likens his studies of fish to humans as a Ford model T to a Ferrari.

"Our knowledge is now so detailed that we have been able to make computer models based on detailed knowledge at the cellular and molecular level and create a virtual lamprey," Grillner said.

For more than a decade, Grillner has served as a member of the Nobel assembly for the Nobel Prize given in the areas of physiology or medicine and the committee's chairman from 1987-1990. He has written more than 350 articles and has received numerous awards for his work in the neurosciences and is a member of the National Academy of Science in Europe, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and the Norwegian Academy of Science.

Grillner's work interests CWRU scientists who are also studying neuronal networks-in such animals as cockroaches, crabs, sea slugs and moth-to understand a variety of behaviors that eventually can be used to develop robots or devices to help humans recover lost movement.

CWRU researchers in an interdisciplinary collaboration between biology, engineering and the neurosciences have one of the country's leading robotics groups that have developed robots to traverse terrains and places inaccessible to humans like volcanoes or land-mine fields and have developed electronically-stimulated function systems to replace lost human movement.

The University is also only one of a select few IGERT sites in the country to receive millions of dollars in funding in 1999 to strengthen interdisciplinary graduate programs in the area of neuromechanics. Roy Ritzmann, professor of biology and neurosciences, directs the program that includes selected faculty members from biology, biomedical engineering, electrical engineering and computer science and mechanical and aerospace engineering. Ritzmann, with Pat Crago, the Allen H. and Constance T. Ford Professor and chair of biomedical engineering, designed the IGERT program at CWRU.

"The scope of these (neuroscience-related) projects requires a significant level of collaboration among researchers in different disciplines," said Al Pollack, IGERT coordinator in the biology department.

He adds that IGERT invites leaders in the field of neuromechanics to expose students and faculty to the design implications and requirements of successful interdisciplinary research, "and also have the opportunity for personal communication with some of the world's most respected scientists."

Hillel Chiel, professor of biology, neurosciences and biomedical engineering, studies the California sea slug for potential underwater robotic devices or ones that can travel through human blood vessels and is interested in Grillner's pioneering work.

"He has used a broad range of techniques: recording electrical activity of individual nerve cells in the spinal cord, analyzing the ion channels and transmitters used by the neurons and developing computer simulations of the neural network controlling the behavior of the body, so that it is possible to understand how the nervous system, body and environment interact to generate flexible behavior," Chiel said.

For information, call 216-368-3591.