Neuroscience

Micro-scale control of oligodendrocyte morphology and myelination by the intellectual disability-linked protein acyltransferase ZDHHC9

1. Hey-Kyeong Jeong
2. Estibaliz Gonzalez-Fernandez
3. Ilan Crawley
4. Julia M Coakley
5. Jinha Hwang
6. Dale DO Martin
7. Shernaz X Bamji
8. Jong-Il Kim
9. Shin H Kang
10. Gareth M Thomas

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study provides an in-depth exploration of the impact of X-linked ZDHHC9 gene mutations on cognitive deficits and epilepsy, with a particular focus on the expression and function of ZDHHC9 in myelin-forming oligodendrocytes (OLs). These valuable findings offer insights into ZDHHC9-related X-linked intellectual disability (XLID) and shed light on the regulatory mechanisms of palmitoylation in myelination. The experimental design and analysis of results are solid, providing a reference for further research in this field.

Reviewed by eLife

Mother-child dyadic interactions shape the developing social brain and Theory of Mind in young children

1. Lei Li
2. Jinming Xiao
3. Weixing Zhao
4. Qingyu Zheng
5. Xinyue Huang
6. Xiaolong Shan
7. Yating Ming
8. Peng Wang
9. Zhen Wu
10. Huafu Chen
11. Vinod Menon
12. Xujun Duan

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important study reports solid evidence for the significant role of mother-child neural synchronization and relationship quality in the development of Theory of Mind (ToM) and social cognition. The findings effectively bridge brain development with children's behavior and parenting practices, and will be of interest to researchers studying brain development and social cognition, as well as the general public.

Reviewed by eLife

Deletion of Neuroligins from Astrocytes Does Not Detectably Alter Synapse Numbers or Astrocyte Cytoarchitecture by Maturity

1. Samantha R Golf
2. Justin H Trotter
3. Jinzhao Wang
4. George Nakahara
5. Xiao Han
6. Marius Wernig
7. Thomas C Südhof

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This fundamental study examines whether synaptic cell adhesion molecules neuroligin 1-3 resident on astrocytes, rather than neurons, exert effects on synaptic structure and function. With compelling evidence, including rigorous validation of neuroligin deletion efficiency in astrocytes and independent confirmation using human neuron-mouse glia co-cultures, the authors report that deletion of neuroligins 1-3 specifically in astrocytes does not alter synapse formation or astrocyte morphology in the hippocampus or visual cortex. This study provides definitive evidence highlighting the specific role of neuronal neuroligins rather than their astrocytic counterparts in synaptogenesis.

Reviewed by eLife

Age-dependent predictors of effective reinforcement motor learning across childhood

1. Nayo M Hill
2. Haley M Tripp
3. Daniel M Wolpert
4. Laura A Malone
5. Amy J Bastian

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important study tests the development of motor reinforcement learning from toddlerhood to adulthood, using a large online sample. They show that learning improves with age in a task that, like real-life movement, involves a continuous range of response options and probabilistic rewards, and link this shift to reduced movement variability and more efficient feedback-based learning through behavioural modeling. Simplifying the task with discrete actions and deterministic outcomes boosted younger children's performance, suggesting early learning is limited by spatial and probabilistic processing. The evidence is convincing, although future work may investigate more naturalistic movement.

Reviewed by eLife

Elucidating the selection mechanisms in context-dependent computation through low-rank neural network modeling

1. Yiteng Zhang
2. Jianfeng Feng
3. Bin Min

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study provides an important set of analyses and theoretical derivations to understand the mechanisms used by recurrent neural networks (RNNs) to perform context-dependent accumulation of evidence. The results regarding the dimensionality and neural dynamical signatures of RNNs are convincing and provide new avenues to study the mechanisms underlying context-dependent computations. This manuscript will be of interest to a broad audience in systems and computational neuroscience.

Reviewed by eLife

Human Brain-Wide Activation of Sleep Rhythms

1. Haiteng Wang
2. Qihong Zou
3. Jinbo Zhang
4. Jia-Hong Gao
5. Yunzhe Liu

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  The study reports valuable findings from a very rich EEG-fMRI dataset, including 107 participants, which was collected during nocturnal naps. Using overall solid methods, the authors link activity in memory-related brain regions (e.g., hippocampus, thalamus, and medial prefrontal cortex), and their functional connectivity to the occurrence of canonical sleep rhythms (spindles and slow oscillations) in non-rapid eye movement sleep. This work will be of broad interest to sleep and memory researchers and beyond.

Reviewed by eLife

Neural dynamics of reversal learning in the prefrontal cortex and recurrent neural networks

1. Christopher M Kim
2. Carson C Chow
3. Bruno B Averbeck

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  The findings of this study are valuable, offering insights into the neural representation of reversal probability in decision-making tasks, with potential implications for understanding flexible behavior in changing environments. The study contains interesting comparisons between neural data and models, including evidence for partial consistency with line attractor models in this probabilistic reversal learning task. However, it remains incomplete due to issues related to how the RNN training and the analysis of its dynamics, which renders the evidence as not complete.

Reviewed by eLife

Material Damage to Multielectrode Arrays after Electrolytic Lesioning is in the Noise

1. Alice Tor
2. Stephen E Clarke
3. Iliana E Bray
4. Paul Nuyujukian
5. the Brain Interfacing Laboratory

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This useful manuscript addresses a stability issue for long-term chronically implanted array recordings and electrolytic lesioning, which is relevant to both basic science and translational research. The authors provide a systematic scanning electron microscopy (SEM) of explanted arrays, evaluating electrode damage and sharing extensive datasets accessible through interactive plots. The strength of the evidence is solid, but it can be improved by performing additional analyses on complementary neurophysiology, functional, or histological data.

Reviewed by eLife

Calpain cleaves the carboxyl terminus of TRPV1 and modulates receptor tachyphylaxis

1. Jinyan Jiang
2. Xiaochen Wang
3. Jing Yang
4. Shuwen Gao
5. Jixuan Xu
6. Jiao Liu
7. Yun Wang
8. Ping Liang
9. Ying Zhang

Reviewed by Arcadia Science

Intrinsic dynamic shapes responses to external stimulation in the human brain

1. Maximilian Nentwich
2. Marcin Leszczynski
3. Charles E Schroeder
4. Stephan Bickel
5. Lucas C Parra

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This manuscript presents an interesting new framework (VARX) for simultaneously quantifying effective connectivity in brain activity during sensory stimulation and how that brain activity is being driven by that sensory stimulation. The reviewers thought the model was original and its conclusion that intrinsic connectivity is reduced (rather than increased) during sensory stimulation is very interesting, but that for ideal performance, one must specify all sensory features in the model, which is not possible. Overall, however, this work is important with convincing evidence for its conclusions - it will be of interest to neuroscientists working on brain connectivity and dynamics.

Reviewed by eLife