Neuroscience

Different brain systems support learning from received and avoided pain during human pain-avoidance learning

1. Marieke Jepma
2. Mathieu Roy
3. Kiran Ramlakhan
4. Monique van Velzen
5. Albert Dahan

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  This manuscript is of particular interest to readers in the field of pain research. The identification of separate brain systems associated with learning from unexpected pain and learning from unexpected pain relief contributes to understanding of pain avoidance learning. The combination of behavioral data, neuroimaging and computational modeling provide support for many of the central claims of the paper, however weaknesses in the experimental design limit the support for the claims based on the results of the pharmacological manipulation.

  (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. Reviewer #1 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife

Frequency- and spike-timing-dependent mitochondrial Ca2+ signaling regulates the metabolic rate and synaptic efficacy in cortical neurons

1. Ohad Stoler
2. Alexandra Stavsky
3. Yana Khrapunsky
4. Israel Melamed
5. Grace Stutzmann
6. Daniel Gitler
7. Israel Sekler
8. Ilya Fleidervish

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  This work describes how mitochondrial calcium in different regions of pyramidal neurons is controlled by action potentials and synaptic input. The authors show that calcium is controlled in a highly non-linear manner by calcium entry into cells (through voltage-dependent calcium channels) during sequences of action potentials. A particularly interesting finding is the high degree of localization of calcium rises in individual mitochondria in dendrites, and the requirement for both synaptic input and back-propagating action potentials to produce prominent rises of calcium in dendritic mitochondria. The work provides fundamental new information about how calcium entry during action potentials and synaptic input controls mitochondrial function.

  (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. Reviewer #1 and Reviewer #2 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife

Repressing PTBP1 fails to convert reactive astrocytes to dopaminergic neurons in a 6-hydroxydopamine mouse model of Parkinson’s disease

1. Weizhao Chen
2. Qiongping Zheng
3. Qiaoying Huang
4. Shanshan Ma
5. Mingtao Li

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  This new work from Chen et al. reports on a critical question that is whether astrocytes can be converted in situ into dopaminergic neurons in response to the targeting of specific factors using, for example, gene therapy. This is a very strong, elegant and straightforward study. It is of broad interest and of high translational relevance.

  (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. Reviewer #2 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife

Early lock-in of structured and specialised information flows during neural development

1. David P Shorten
2. Viola Priesemann
3. Michael Wibral
4. Joseph T Lizier

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  This work analyzes how meaningful connections develop in the nervous system. Studying the dissociated neuronal cultures, the authors find that the information processing connections develop after 5-10 days. The direction of the information flow is influenced by neuronal bursting properties: the early bursting neurons emerge as sources and late bursting neurons become sinks in the information flow.

  (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

Coupling of pupil- and neuronal population dynamics reveals diverse influences of arousal on cortical processing

1. Thomas Pfeffer
2. Christian Keitel
3. Daniel S Kluger
4. Anne Keitel
5. Alena Russmann
6. Gregor Thut
7. Tobias H Donner
8. Joachim Gross

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  The study presents novel results on spontaneous fluctuations in pupil dilation in relation to the spectral dynamics in a large sample of human participants. The study is based on MEG recordings allowing for quantifying these relations in time and space. The data provide important new insight into the temporal and spatial characteristics of pupil-linked changes in cortical states which form the basis for incorporating this insight in future clinical and cognitive neuroscience studies.

  (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. Reviewer #1, Reviewer #2 and Reviewer #3 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife

An open-source tool for automated analysis of breathing behaviors in common marmosets and rodents

1. Mitchell Bishop
2. Maximilian Weinhold
3. Ariana Z Turk
4. Afuh Adeck
5. Shahriar SheikhBahaei

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  This manuscript from Bishop et al aims to quantify the hypoxic and hyperoxic ventilatory response in the marmoset, an increasingly more common primate research model. The strongest contribution of the paper is the presentation of an analysis toolkit to perform unsupervised analyses of respiratory data, which are not widely available.

  (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

SARS-CoV-2 entry sites are present in all structural elements of the human glossopharyngeal and vagal nerves: Clinical implications

1. Lynn Vitale-Cross
2. Ildiko Szalayova
3. Aiden Scoggins
4. Miklos Palkovits
5. Eva Mezey

Reviewed by ScreenIT

Invariant representation of physical stability in the human brain

1. RT Pramod
2. Michael A Cohen
3. Joshua B Tenenbaum
4. Nancy Kanwisher

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  This is an intriguing study using cleverly designed stimuli to investigate the representation of physical stability in the human brain. This paper will be of interest to readers wondering when human cognition uses generalizable pattern matching similar to that used by machine learning algorithms, and when it relies on more specialized processes evolved for specific tasks. The well-crafted experiments generally support the authors' major claim.

  (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. Reviewer #1 and Reviewer #3 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife

Opioid analgesia alters corticospinal coupling along the descending pain system in healthy participants

1. Alexandra Tinnermann
2. Christian Sprenger
3. Christian Büchel

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  This is a challenging study exploring the effects of a commonly used analgesic, remifentanil, on brain and spinal cord related pain processing in humans. It is of considerable interest to the pain research, neuroimaging and opioid neuroscience communities and are also relevant to clinicians who commonly use opioid infusions. The authors have used sophisticated methods for combined brain and spinal cord functional magnetic resonance imaging to examine the influence of an intravenous opioid on pain processing in the ascending and descending pain pathways in healthy subjects. The authors have conducted a comprehensive assessment in large numbers of subjects and have explored both changes in amplitude of activity as well as connectivity. Their detailed analysis strengthens findings from previous human and animal studies and extend to demonstrate novel changes in connectivity in the descending pathway to the spinal cord although these data are potentially compatible with alternative interpretations and may need to be reinforced by further analysis.

  (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. Reviewer #2 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife

Perception is associated with the brain’s metabolic response to sensory stimulation

1. Mauro DiNuzzo
2. Silvia Mangia
3. Marta Moraschi
4. Daniele Mascali
5. Gisela E Hagberg
6. Federico Giove

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  Giove and colleagues demonstrate an intriguing dissociation of neurovascular (as measured with BOLD-fMRI) and neurometabolic (measured with fMRS) responses during perception. This is a thought-provoking study that makes one wonder about the signals we measure with human neuroimaging, especially fMRI. It will therefore be of great interest to the broad community of neuroimagers, as well as perception researchers.

  (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. Reviewer #1, Reviewer #2 and Reviewer #3 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife