Neuroscience

Volume electron microscopy reveals unique laminar synaptic characteristics in the human entorhinal cortex

1. Sergio Plaza-Alonso
2. Nicolas Cano-Astorga
3. Javier DeFelipe
4. Lidia Alonso-Nanclares

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This study presents a useful examination of dense neuroanatomy in human postmortem medial entorhinal cortex, using a large number of small electron microscopy image volumes sampled from multiple cortical layers and individuals. The authors use solid experimental and annotation techniques, demonstrating the suitability of postmortem tissue reconstructions for analysis and presenting careful, detailed measurements of synapse properties and overall tissue composition. However, there is inadequate support connecting these findings to claims about general connectivity in medial entorhinal cortex, since factors affecting interpretability like noise, the spatial scales examined, and relationships between structural properties and connectivity are not characterized. With a more thorough contextualization, this work would be of interest for studies of cellular neuroanatomy or brain network organization.

Reviewed by eLife

Plasticity-induced actin polymerization in the dendritic shaft regulates intracellular AMPA receptor trafficking

1. Victor C Wong
2. Patrick R Houlihan
3. Hui Liu
4. Deepika Walpita
5. Michael C DeSantis
6. Zhe Liu
7. Erin K O'Shea

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  In this manuscript, the authors developed a sensitive single particle tracking method for endogenous AMPA receptors. They found that AMPAR-containing vesicles showed reduced mobility near stimulation sites, likely due to increased F-actin bundling in dendritic shafts. The study found a novel mechanism of AMPAR trafficking using state-of-the-art labeling and analysis techniques, and thus will be of great interest for broad audience. However, their conclusion requires additional experimental support.

  (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. The reviewers remained anonymous to the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife

GABAergic synaptic scaling is triggered by changes in spiking activity rather than AMPA receptor activation

1. Carlos Gonzalez-Islas
2. Zahraa Sabra
3. Ming-fai Fong
4. Pernille Yilmam
5. Nicholas Au Yong
6. Kathrin Engisch
7. Peter Wenner

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This is an important study that brings insight into mechanisms that underlie regulation of GABAergic transmission in response to changes in activity. The authors present solid data supporting the premise that action potential firing rather than excitatory synaptic strength is a key determinant of GABAergic synaptic inputs.

Reviewed by eLife

Midbrain encodes sound detection behavior without auditory cortex

1. Tai-Ying Lee
2. Yves Weissenberger
3. Andrew J King
4. Johannes C Dahmen

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This study demonstrates that neurons receiving inputs from auditory cortex in the inferior colliculus widely encode the outcome of a sound detection task independant of the presence of auditory cortex. This valuable study based on imaging of transynaptically labelled neurons provides convincing evidence that auditory cortex is necessary neither for sound detection, nor to channel information related to behavioral outcome to the subcortical auditory system. This study will be of wide interest for sensory neuroscientists.

Reviewed by eLife

DBT is a metabolic switch for maintenance of proteostasis under proteasomal impairment

1. Ran-Der Hwang
2. YuNing Lu
3. Qing Tang
4. Goran Periz
5. Giho Park
6. Xiangning Li
7. Qiwang Xiang
8. Yang Liu
9. Tao Zhang
10. Jiou Wang

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This important study discovered DBT as a novel gene implicated in the resistance to MG132-mediated cytotoxicity and potentially also in the pathogenesis of ALS and FTD, two fatal neurodegenerative diseases. The authors provided convincing evidence to support a mechanism by which loss of DBT suppresses MG132-mediated toxicity via promoting autophagy. This work will be of interest to cell biologists and biochemists, especially in the FTD/ALS field.

Reviewed by eLife

Novel cyclic homogeneous oscillation detection method for high accuracy and specific characterization of neural dynamics

1. Hohyun Cho
2. Markus Adamek
3. Jon T Willie
4. Peter Brunner

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  Building on previous toolboxes to distinguish 1/f noise from oscillatory activity, this study introduces an important advancement in neural signal analysis to identify oscillatory activity in electrophysiological data that refines the accuracy of identifying non-sinusoidal neural oscillations. Extensive validation, using synthetic and various empirical data, provides convincing evidence for the accuracy of the method and outlines practical implications for relevant scientific problems in the field.

Reviewed by eLife

Human HPSE2 gene transfer ameliorates bladder pathophysiology in a mutant mouse model of urofacial syndrome

1. Filipa M Lopes
2. Celine Grenier
3. Benjamin W Jarvis
4. Sara Al Mahdy
5. Adrian Lène-McKay
6. Alison M Gurney
7. William G Newman
8. Simon N Waddington
9. Adrian S Woolf
10. Neil A Roberts

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  Urofacial syndrome is a rare early-onset lower urinary tract disorder characterized by variants in HPSE2, the gene encoding heparanase-2. This study provides a useful proof-of-principle demonstration that AAV9-based gene therapy for urofacial syndrome is feasible and safe at least over the time frame evaluated, with restoration of HPSE2 expression leading to re-establishment of evoked contraction and relaxation of bladder and outflow tract tissue, respectively, in organ bath studies. The evidence is, however, still incomplete. The work would benefit from evaluation of additional replicates for several endpoints, quantitative assessment of HPSE2 expression, inclusion of in vivo analyses such as void spot assays or cystometry, single-cell analysis of the urinary tract in mutants versus controls, and addressing concerns regarding the discrepancy in HPSE2 expression between bladder tissue and liver in humans and mice.

Reviewed by eLife

Prion diseases disrupt glutamate/glutamine metabolism in skeletal muscle

1. Davide Caredio
2. Maruša Koderman
3. Karl J. Frontzek
4. Silvia Sorce
5. Mario Nuvolone
6. Juliane Bremer
7. Giovanni Mariutti
8. Petra Schwarz
9. Lidia Madrigal
10. Marija Mitrovic
11. Stefano Sellitto
12. Nathalie Streichenberger
13. Claudia Scheckel
14. Adriano Aguzzi

Reviewed by Review Commons

Implicit auditory memory in older listeners: from encoding to 6-month retention

1. Roberta Bianco
2. Edward T. R. Hall
3. Marcus. T. Pearce
4. Maria Chait

Reviewed by PREreview

Factorized visual representations in the primate visual system and deep neural networks

1. Jack W Lindsey
2. Elias B Issa

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  The study makes a valuable empirical contribution to our understanding of visual processing in primates and deep neural networks, with a specific focus on the concept of factorization. The analyses provide convincing evidence that high factorization scores are correlated with neural predictivity. This work will be of interest to systems neuroscientists studying vision and could inspire further research that ultimately may lead to better models of or a better understanding of the brain.

Reviewed by eLife