Neuroscience

The NIH BRAIN Initiative’s Impacts in Systems and Computational Neuroscience and Team-Scale Research, 2014-2023

1. Farah Bader
2. Clayton Bingham
3. Karen K David
4. Hermon Gebrehiwet
5. Crystal Lantz
6. Grace CY Peng
7. Mauricio Rangel-Gomez
8. James Gnadt

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  The manuscript presents some useful accounts of experiences funding team projects within the BRAIN Initiative. These would be more appropriate to add to the companion manuscript since the present manuscript contains some overlapping analyses and does not stand well on its own. Therefore the evidence supporting the conclusions is incomplete.

Reviewed by eLife

Relative Timescale of Channel Voltage-Dependence and Channel Density Regulation Impacts Assembly and Recovery of Activity

1. Yugarshi Mondal
2. Ronald L. Calabrese
3. Eve Marder

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important computational study investigates homeostatic plasticity mechanisms that neurons may employ to achieve and maintain stable target activity patterns. The work extends previous analyses of calcium-dependent homeostatic mechanisms based on ion channel density by considering activity-dependent shifts in channel activation and inactivation properties that operate on faster and potentially variable timescales. The model simulations demonstrate the potential functional importance of these mechanisms, but the evidence is incomplete and would be strengthened by more in-depth analyses and explicit exposition.

Reviewed by eLife

Longitudinal assessment of DREADD expression and efficacy in the monkey brain

1. Yuji Nagai
2. Yukiko Hori
3. Ken-ichi Inoue
4. Toshiyuki Hirabayashi
5. Koki Mimura
6. Kei Oyama
7. Naohisa Miyakawa
8. Yuki Hori
9. Haruhiko Iwaoki
10. Katsushi Kumata
11. Ming-Rong Zhang
12. Masahiko Takada
13. Makoto Higuchi
14. Takafumi Minamimoto

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study provides a novel and critically important insight into the long-term use of DREADDs to modulate neuronal activity in nonhuman primates. The methods are compelling, demonstrating the peak dynamics and the subsequent stability of chemogenetic effects for 1.5 years, informing experimental designs and interpretation of highly impactful chemogenetic studies in macaques. The protocols, data, and outcomes can serve as guidelines for future experiments. Therefore, the findings will be of significant interest to the field of chemogenetics and may also be of broader interest to researchers and clinicians who seek to utilize viral vectors and/or related genetic technologies.

Reviewed by eLife

Precision cutaneous stimulation in freely moving mice

1. Isobel Parkes
2. Ara Schorscher-Petcu
3. Qinyi Gan
4. Liam E Browne

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This valuable study combines real-time keypoint tracking with transdermal activation of sensory neurons to investigate sensory neuron recruitment in freely moving mice, and builds on the authors' prior work in stationary mice. The evidence supporting the utility of the system is solid, although a more thorough classification of the behavioral responses to nociceptor stimulation would strengthen the work. Importantly, future analyses could include other cutaneous sensory neuron subtypes, and could also be adapted for studying more complex behaviors. The work will be of interest to sensory biologists and pain researchers.

Reviewed by eLife

Evolution of taste processing shifts dietary preference

1. Enrico Bertolini
2. Daniel Münch
3. Justine Pascual
4. Noemi Sgammeglia
5. Carlos Ribeiro
6. Thomas O. Auer

Reviewed by preLights

Synchronous Ensembles of Hippocampal CA1 Pyramidal Neurons During Novel Exploration

1. En-Li Chen
2. Tsai-Wen Chen
3. Eric R. Schreiter
4. Bei-Jung Lin

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  In this useful study, the authors perform voltage imaging of CA1 pyramidal cells in head-fixed mice running on a track while local field potentials (LFPs) are recorded. The authors conclude that synchronous ensembles of neurons are differentially associated with different types of LFP patterns, namely theta and ripples. However, evidence for the claims in the paper remains incomplete, due to caveats of the experimental approach and claims that are based on a relatively sparse data set collected with a cutting-edge but still largely untested method.

Reviewed by eLife

Quantification of the effect of hemodynamic occlusion in two-photon imaging of mouse cortex

1. Baba Yogesh
2. Matthias Heindorf
3. Rebecca Jordan
4. Georg B Keller

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important study conducted experiments to quantify how neural activity independent changes in fluorescence might affect two-photon recordings when using diverse sensors. The researchers found a widespread presence of neural-activity-independent artifacts in two-photon imaging and provide convincing evidence that these artifacts are most likely caused by hemodynamic occlusion. Their findings underscore the importance of accounting for these artifacts when interpreting functional two-photon recordings.

Reviewed by eLife

Olfactory ensheathing cells from adult female rats are hybrid glia that promote neural repair

1. Patricia E Phelps
2. Sung Min Ha
3. Rana R Khankan
4. Mahlet A Mekonnen
5. Giovanni Juarez
6. Kaitlin L Ingraham Dixie
7. Yen-Wei Chen
8. Xia Yang

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study unveils important data describing cell states of olfactory ensheathing cells, and how these cell states may relate to repair after spinal cord injury. The framework used for characterizing these cells is solid. This work will be of interest to stem cell biologists and spinal cord injury researchers.

Reviewed by eLife

The magnitude and time course of pre-saccadic foveal prediction depend on the conspicuity of the saccade target

1. Lisa M Kroell
2. Martin Rolfs

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study reports important findings about pre-saccadic foveal prediction and the extent to which it is influenced by the visibility of the saccade target relative to its background. The research methodology and results make a convincing case that foveal congruency effects develop when salient local contrast variations at the saccade target location can be used to direct the eye movement. This work should be of broad interest to visual neuroscientists, as well as those interested in understanding perception in the context of eye movements and in modeling visually guided actions.

Reviewed by eLife

Drosophila epidermal cells are intrinsically mechanosensitive and modulate nociceptive behavioral outputs

1. Jiro Yoshino
2. Sonali S Mali
3. Claire R Williams
4. Takeshi Morita
5. Chloe E Emerson
6. Christopher J Arp
7. Sophie E Miller
8. Chang Yin
9. Lydia Thé
10. Chikayo Hemmi
11. Mana Motoyoshi
12. Kenichi Ishii
13. Kazuo Emoto
14. Diana M Bautista
15. Jay Z Parrish

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This is important work and provides a significant advance in our understanding of mechanosensation in the epidermis. The evidence presented is convincing and, barring a few minor weaknesses, strongly implicates activation of epidermal cells and store-operated calcium entry in the activation of nociceptive neurons innervating that tissue. This work will be of broad interest to neurobiologists, epithelial cell biologists, and mechanobiologists.

Reviewed by eLife, Arcadia Science