High vocal center

HVC (formerly called the High Vocal Center) is a nucleus in the brain of the songbirds (order passeriformes) necessary for both the learning and the production of bird song. It is located in the lateral caudal nidopallium and has projections to both the direct and the anterior forebrain pathways.

It is notable that both of the other orders of birds that learn song, the hummingbirds and parrots, also seem to have structures similar to the HVC. Since it is believed that all three of these groups independently derived the ability to learn song, it is believed that these other HVC-like structures are examples of homoplasy.

Nomenclature

HVc was originally called the Hyperstriatum Ventrale, pars caudale, higher vocal centre or HVc. When the nomenclature of the avian brain was revised in 2004, however, for various reasons these names were dropped(http://www.annalsnyas.org/cgi/content/full/1016/1/77). In order to keep the same acronym the structure was renamed the HVc. The acronym HVC now is the official name for the region, despite no longer standing for anything.

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