Neuroscience, as an integrated interdisciplinary field, dates back to the late 1960s and early 1970s, when the MIT study program of that name was initiated. Neurogenetics is a more recent field, which really began when the study of biochemical mechanisms in the brain was mature enough to allow the introduction of genetic techniques (inbred, mutant, transgenic or knockout mice), thus helping to understand the mechanisms of various diseases, as well as the normal functions of the brain that depend on an increasing number of transmitters and receptors. The genetics of brain development can also be mentioned as a very important field of research, which has developed recently. However, recent scientific advances in neurogenetics should not be separated from other previously established fields of research, such as behavioral physiology or psychology, which have provided much material for pre-existing ideological discussions, such as the nature-nurture controversy, which is still very much ongoing. (DEBRU, 2007)
As an example of the involvement of all these various scientific, philosophical and ideological aspects in contemporary research, I will address a particular domain, the physiology of sleep and dreaming, which seems particularly suited to demonstrate how facts and speculations coexist and interact in science, but also to demonstrate how the genetic approach can be useful for solving problems in physiology and pathology. However, before entering into the subject of sleep physiology (largely shaped by Michel Jouvet, William Dement and their colleagues over the last fifty years), it may be useful to make some comments on other aspects of the involvement of genetics in earlier physiology and psychology, as well as in contemporary neuroscience, including its behavioral and cognitive dimensions. (DEBRU, 2007)
Many fields (virtually all fields) of contemporary neuroscience are shaped by genetic research, sometimes in ways that are less expected and obvious than others. Memory and learning, language, neurological diseases, circadian rhythms, and sleep patterns are just a few examples of the increasingly common genetic components of brain function. A more revealing and unexpected example of the role of genes in physiology is found in the studies of memory and learning carried out by Eric Kandel over the past fifty years on the marine mollusk Aplysia californica. Indeed, the idea that learning (or at least part of its functioning) occurs through the modification of a genetic mechanism of transcription and translation may at first seem quite counterintuitive. In a recent account of his work, Kandel has beautifully shown the path his research has taken from the study of synaptic plasticity and its role in short-term memory to the discovery of the role of genetic events in long-term memory. This distinction between short-term and long-term effects on memory dates back (at least) to the end of the nineteenth century. (Debru, 2007)
Reference:
DEBRU, Claude. Genetics and neuroscience: Some examples of their recent convergence and of the continuing nature-nurture controversy, with emphasis on sleep physiology. In: FAGOT-LARGEAULT, Anne et al. (eds.). The influence of genetics on contemporary thinking. Netherlands: Springer, 2007. chap. 2, p. 25-32.
