Affiliations: Man-Vehicle Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 77 Mass. Ave., Rm 37-29, Cambridge, MA 02139-4307, USA. Tel.: +1 617 253 7759; Fax: +1 617 258 8111; E-mail: [email protected]
Note: [*] Based on the keynote address and Festschrift at the 6th Symposium on the Vestibular System and the Exploration of Space, Portland OR, October 2002. The author’s views represent the perspective seen with his students and colleagues at the MIT Man-Vehicle Laboratory from 1963–2003. Supported by the National Space Biomedical Research
Institute under Grant NCC 9-58. The author acknowledges A. Berthoz and his colleagues at the LPPA, College de France, Paris,
for their help in preparing this paper, and Jessica Edmonds for her assistance in the preparation of the figures and text
Abstract: Dynamic models have played a more prominent role in the vestibular and oculomotor field than in any other branch of physiology. The ease of identification of input and output variables and the challenge of multi-loop, multi-axis adaptive control has attracted numerous modelers from engineering and shaped behavioral and neurophysiological experimental programs. In particular, the adaptive characteristics of the neurovestibular system have generated continuing speculation as to mechanisms. This treatment of adaptation and multi-sensor integration covers the development and application of such models, principally in the author's laboratory. It emphasizes the continuing relevance of both "model reference" and "error pattern recognition" notions of adaptive control.
