Neuroscience

Ventral tegmental area interneurons revisited: GABA and glutamate projection neurons make local synapses

1. Lucie Oriol
2. Melody Chao
3. Grace J Kollman
4. Dina S Dowlat
5. Sarthak M Singhal
6. Thomas Steinkellner
7. Thomas S Hnasko

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This manuscript provides convincing evidence derived from diverse state-of-the-art approaches to suggest that non-dopaminergic projection neurons in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) make local synapses. These important findings challenge the prevailing wisdom that VTA interneurons exclusively form local synaptic contacts and instead reveal that VTA neurons expressing interneuron markers also form long-range projections to forebrain targets such as the cortex, ventral pallidum, and nucleus accumbens. Given the importance of VTA interneurons to many models of VTA-linked behavioral functions, these findings have significant implications for our understanding of the neural circuits underlying reward, motivation, and addiction.

Reviewed by eLife

Sphingosine-1-phosphate signaling regulates the ability of Müller glia to become neurogenic, proliferating progenitor-like cells

1. Olivia B Taylor
2. Nicholas DeGroff
3. Heithem M El-Hodiri
4. Chengyu Gao
5. Andy J Fischer

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important study investigates the signaling pathways regulating retinal regeneration. Convincing evidence shows that the sphingosine-1-phosphate (S1P) signaling pathway is inhibited following retinal injury. Small-molecule activators and inhibitors support a model in which S1P signaling must be inhibited to generate Müller glial progenitor cells-a key step in retinal regeneration. The presented results support the major conclusions. However, whether the drug treatments directly or indirectly affect the Müller cells remains unclear.

Reviewed by eLife

Mistargeted retinal axons induce a synaptically independent subcircuit in the visual thalamus of albino mice

1. Sean McCracken
2. Liam McCoy
3. Ziyi Hu
4. Julie A Hodges
5. Katia Valkova
6. Philip R Williams
7. Josh L Morgan

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study provides important observations about the role of Hebbian synapse rewiring (which predicts that correlated activity between neurons begets stronger synapses) on brain connectivity development, by examining a naturally emerging case where Hebbian predictions can be tested because neurons with differing activity undergo development under otherwise similar conditions (albino mouse lateral geniculate nucleus [LGN], where retinal ganglion cells [RGCs] from the contralateral retina form inappropriate projections alongside a majority of ipsilateral RGCs). The evidence supporting the conclusions is compelling, with combined confocal imaging and serial electron microscopy (EM) reconstructions showing complete synaptic isolation of aberrantly projecting RGCs onto LGN thalamocortical projection neurons, and mixed connectivity onto LGN local interneurons. The morphological descriptions of connectivity presented here will be of interest to researchers studying synaptic connectivity and plasticity during development.

Reviewed by eLife

Characterization of direct Purkinje cell outputs to the brainstem

1. Christopher H Chen
2. Zhiyi Yao
3. Shuting Wu
4. Wade G Regehr

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important paper provides an unbiased landscape for the cerebellar cortical outputs to the brainstem nuclei. By conducting anatomical and physiological analyses of the axonal terminals of Purkinje cells, the data provides convincing evidence that Purkinje cells innervate brainstem nuclei directly. The results show that in addition to previously known inputs to vestibular and parabrachial nuclei, Purkinje cells synapse onto the pontine central grey nucleus but have little effect on the locus coeruleus and mesencephalic trigeminal neurons.

Reviewed by eLife

Aminergic and peptidergic modulation of insulin-producing cells in Drosophila

1. Martina Held
2. Rituja S Bisen
3. Meet Zandawala
4. Alexander S Chockley
5. Isabella S Balles
6. Selina Hilpert
7. Sander Liessem
8. Federico Cascino-Milani
9. Jan M Ache

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This fundamental study comprehensively characterizes insulin producing cells (IPCs) resident in the Drosophila melanogaster brain. A compelling experimental tour de force, the combination of connectomics, mapping of receptors for neuromodulators, electrophysiological recordings, Calcium imaging and optogenetics demonstrates that IPCs operate as a functionally heterogeneous population, as necessary to address continuously changing metabolic demands. These findings will be of interest to both neuroscientists and physiologists seeking to study context-dependent neuroendocrine regulation.

Reviewed by eLife

Elevated DNA Damage without signs of aging in the short-sleeping Mexican Cavefish

1. Evan Lloyd
2. Fanning Xia
3. Kinsley Moore
4. Carolina Zertuche
5. Aakriti Rastogi
6. Rob Kozol
7. Olga Kenzior
8. Wesley Warren
9. Lior Appelbaum
10. Rachel L Moran
11. Chongbei Zhao
12. Erik Duboue
13. Nicolas Rohner
14. Alex C Keene

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  Lloyd et al. used an evolutionary comparative approach to study DNA damage repair associated with low sleep duration in Astyanax mexicanus, highlighting how the cavefish population has evolved a reduced DNA damage response. The results presented here have important implications. Their results are generally solid however, the evidence suggesting that sleep differences are linked to DNA damage response is missing and this hypothesis remains to be fully tested.

Reviewed by eLife

ARBEL: A Machine Learning Tool with Light-Based Image Analysis for Automatic Classification of 3D Pain Behaviors

1. Omer Barkai
2. Biyao Zhang
3. Bruna Lenfers Turnes
4. Maryam Arab
5. David A Yarmolinsky
6. Zihe Zhang
7. Lee B Barrett
8. Clifford J Woolf

Reviewed by Arcadia Science

The reuniens nucleus of the thalamus facilitates hippocampo-cortical dialogue during sleep

1. Diellor Basha
2. Amirmohammad Azarmehri
3. Elian Proulx
4. Sylvain Chauvette
5. Maryam Ghorbani
6. Igor Timofeev

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  The important manuscript presents convincing evidence of temporal correlations during specific oscillatory activity between the prefrontal cortex, thalamic nucleus reuniens, and the hippocampus, in naturally sleeping animals. Such correlations represent solid evidence to support the notion that the thalamic nucleus reuniens participates in the hippocampal and prefrontal cortex dialogue subserving memory processes.

Reviewed by eLife

Highly sensitive in vivo detection of dynamic changes in enkephalins following acute stress in mice

1. Marwa O Mikati
2. Petra Erdmann-Gilmore
3. Rose Connors
4. Sineadh M Conway
5. Jim Malone
6. Justin Woods
7. Robert W Sprung
8. Reid R Townsend
9. Ream Al-Hasani

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  The authors adapt a previously-established method that permits detection of in vivo extracellular levels of two distinct enkephalin opioid peptides in response to stressful experiences in mice. The present study highlights the potential of measuring actual peptides by microdialysis-LC-MS. They use this approach in conjunction with fiber photometric calcium imaging to correlate enkephalin neuron activity and enkephalin release in response to repeated stress, providing convincing evidence that this improved approach can provide new insights into opioid signaling in-vivo. This important study provides a means to understand various behavioral states controlled by endogenous opioids and the nucleus accumbens, including hedonic and stress responses, in health and disease. This work will be of broad interest to the neuroscientific community.

Reviewed by eLife

Parkinson’s disease-associated Pink1 loss disrupts vesicle trafficking in Ensheathing glia causing dopaminergic neuron synapse loss

1. Lorenzo Ghezzi
2. Ulrike Pech
3. Nils Schoovaerts
4. Suresh Poovathingal
5. Kristofer Davie
6. Jochen Lamote
7. Roman Praschberger
8. Patrik Verstreken

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  The preliminary data presented in this manuscript seem valuable. The data are currently incomplete and there are numerous technical concerns, some of which may arise from insufficient description of methodologies used.

Reviewed by eLife