Neuroscience

Diversity and evolution of cerebellar folding in mammals

1. Katja Heuer
2. Nicolas Traut
3. Alexandra Allison de Sousa
4. Sofie Louise Valk
5. Julien Clavel
6. Roberto Toro

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This important study gives novel insight into the folding diversity of the cerebellum compared to the cerebrum among 56 mammalian species. Based on impressive data, the analyses performed for anatomical descriptions and phylogenetic comparisons are solid, although some issues need to be addressed regarding the choice of statistical models, and the sample size versus the number of explanatory variables. This study will be of interest to neuroscientists, evolutionary and developmental biologists, and physicists interested in biomechanics, as these observations provide a basis for models of brain folding mechanisms.

Reviewed by eLife

Balancing true and false detection of intermittent sensory targets by adjusting the inputs to the evidence accumulation process

1. Anna C Geuzebroek
2. Hannah Craddock
3. Redmond G O'Connell
4. Simon P Kelly

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This research provides convincing evidence that standard behavioral modeling and EEG-derived signatures of the decision process may not agree on mechanisms underlying changes in decision strategy. The authors make a strong case for the importance of informing behavioral modeling with putative neural signatures of the corresponding decision processes. The assumptions of this neurally-informed modeling approach should be further explored and clarified to highlight not only its benefits but also potential caveats.

Reviewed by eLife

Task-dependent optimal representations for cerebellar learning

1. Marjorie Xie
2. Samuel P Muscinelli
3. Kameron Decker Harris
4. Ashok Litwin-Kumar

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  Models of cerebellar function and the coding of inputs in the cerebellum often assume that random stimuli are a reasonable stand-in for real stimuli. However, the important contribution of this paper is that conclusions about optimality and sparseness in these models do not generalize to potentially more realistic sets of stimuli, for example, those drawn from a low-dimensional manifold. While the mathematical modelling and analysis in the paper are convincing, one important limitation of the paper is that the neural dynamics and circuit architecture are not very specific to the cerebellum, and lack important biological detail.

Reviewed by eLife

Cholinergic modulation shifts the response of CA1 pyramidal cells to depolarizing ramps via TRPM4 channels with potential implications for place field firing

1. Crescent L Combe
2. Carol M Upchurch
3. Carmen C Canavier
4. Sonia Gasparini

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This manuscript by Combe et al. presents the role of cholinergic modulation in the spike rate adaptation in pyramidal place cells. Using combined electrophysiology, pharmacological, and multi-compartment computational modeling, the authors identify the downstream pathway (e.g. activation of TRPM4 channel) that shapes the firing pattern under the triangular-shaped ramps. The study demonstrates solid evidence, and the findings are important for bridging pyramidal neurons' molecular/channel properties to behavior-level implications (place field firing).

Reviewed by eLife

Large-scale neural dynamics in a shared low-dimensional state space reflect cognitive and attentional dynamics

1. Hayoung Song
2. Won Mok Shim
3. Monica D Rosenberg

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This valuable study examines the distribution of four states of brain activity across a variety of cognitive conditions, linking systems neuroscience with cognition and behavior. The work is convincing, using null models and replication in independent datasets to support their findings.

Reviewed by eLife

Generating human neural diversity with a multiplexed morphogen screen in organoids

1. Neal D. Amin
2. Kevin W. Kelley
3. Konstantin Kaganovsky
4. Massimo Onesto
5. Jin Hao
6. Yuki Miura
7. James P. McQueen
8. Noah Reis
9. Genta Narazaki
10. Tommy Li
11. Shravanti Kulkarni
12. Sergey Pavlov
13. Sergiu P. Pașca

Reviewed by preLights

Hippocampal remapping induced by new behavior is mediated by spatial context

1. Samuel J. Levy
2. Michael E. Hasselmo

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  The formation of the place cell map in the hippocampus is foundational to many models and is thought to form a substrate onto which memories can be structured. This paper presents an important new observation to our understanding of place cell formation - namely that task learning changes or interferes with the process of place cell map stabilization. Reviewers found that there was incomplete evidence for this result, however, in this version of the manuscript because of a confound between the duration of experience in an environment and task-specific learning.

Reviewed by eLife

Neuronal glutamate transporters control reciprocal inhibition and gain modulation in D1 medium spiny neurons

1. Maurice A Petroccione
2. Lianna Y D'Brant
3. Nurat Affinnih
4. Patrick H Wehrle
5. Gabrielle C Todd
6. Shergil Zahid
7. Haley E Chesbro
8. Ian L Tschang
9. Annalisa Scimemi

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This manuscript reports important findings that help to understand the function of glutamate transporters and their effects on synaptic function at D1- and D2-MSNs within the dorsolateral striatum. These findings were evaluated to be of interest and well-executed. Overall, the majority of claims are supported by high quality data, but the evidence for some underlying mechanisms and region specificity were incomplete in the manuscript's current form.

Reviewed by eLife

Competing neural representations of choice shape evidence accumulation in humans

1. Krista Bond
2. Javier Rasero
3. Raghav Madan
4. Jyotika Bahuguna
5. Jonathan Rubin
6. Timothy Verstynen

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This valuable study assesses how change in reward contingency in the environment affects the dynamics of a realistic large-scale neural circuit model, human choice behavior, and fMRI responses measured in the same individuals. It is not entirely clear which predictions of the neural circuit model go beyond previous work, the current results seem incomplete and could likely be substantially strengthened. This study could be of interest to scientists studying the neural and computational bases of adaptive behaviour.

Reviewed by eLife

State-dependent coupling of hippocampal oscillations

1. Brijesh Modi
2. Matteo Guardamagna
3. Federico Stella
4. Marilena Griguoli
5. Enrico Cherubini
6. Francesco P Battaglia

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  Traditional approaches for the analysis of brain rhythms typically rely on measuring spectro-temporal properties of individual oscillations or the interactions between two different oscillations. This manuscript presents a novel multivariate approach that uses a state space model to simultaneously analyze the dynamics and interactions of multiple hippocampal oscillations. Such an approach represents a step forward in the field that highlights the need of taking into account the complexity of network interactions rather than trying to understand each component of the system in isolation.

Reviewed by eLife