Neuroscience

Spatial frequency channels mediate a visual metric for human spatial perception

1. Shijia Zhang
2. Ce Mo
3. Lei Mo
4. Fang Fang

Reviewed by PREreview

Basolateral amygdala oscillations enable fear learning in a biophysical model

1. Anna Cattani
2. Don B Arnold
3. Michelle McCarthy
4. Nancy Kopell

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This valuable modeling study explores how biophysical properties of different interneuron subtypes in the basolateral amygdala (BLA) enable production of oscillations that facilitate functions such as spike-timing-dependent plasticity. Simulated networks provide solid evidence that highlights the importance of interactions between interneurons for some forms of spike-timing dependent plasticity. This work will likely be of interest to investigators studying interactions among interneurons, rhythms in the amygdala, and mechanisms of plasticity thought to underlie associative learning.

Reviewed by eLife

Targeting resident astrocytes attenuates neuropathic pain after spinal cord injury

1. Qing Zhao
2. Yanjing Zhu
3. Yilong Ren
4. Lijuan Zhao
5. Jingwei Zhao
6. Shuai Yin
7. Haofei Ni
8. Rongrong Zhu
9. Liming Cheng
10. Ning Xie

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important study demonstrated that ablation of astrocytes in the lumbar spinal cord not only reduced neuropathic pain but also caused microglia activation. The findings presented add considerable value to the current understanding of the role of astrocyte elimination in neuropathic pain, offering convincing evidence that supports existing hypotheses and insights into the interactions between astrocytes and microglial cells, likely through IFN-mediated mechanisms

Reviewed by eLife

Assemblies, synapse clustering and network topology interact with plasticity to explain structure-function relationships of the cortical connectome

1. András Ecker
2. Daniela Egas Santander
3. Marwan Abdellah
4. Jorge Blanco Alonso
5. Sirio Bolaños-Puchet
6. Giuseppe Chindemi
7. Dhuruva Priyan Gowri Mariyappan
8. James B. Isbister
9. James Gonzalo King
10. Pramod Kumbhar
11. Ioannis Magkanaris
12. Eilif B. Muller
13. Michael W. Reimann

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This useful study presents a biologically realistic, large-scale cortical model of the rat's non-barrel somatosensory cortex, investigating synaptic plasticity of excitatory connections under varying patterns of external activations and characterizing relations between network architecture and plasticity outcomes. While the model demonstrates several interesting phenomena, the results are less explanatory of causal relationships and more observational in nature; hence the evidence supporting the main conclusions remains incomplete.

Reviewed by eLife

Modulation of aperiodic EEG activity provides sensitive index of cognitive state changes during working memory task

1. Tisa Frelih
2. Andraž Matkovič
3. Tjaša Mlinarič
4. Jurij Bon
5. Grega Repovš

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This valuable work explores the timely idea that aperiodic activity in human electrophysiology recordings shows changes in response to task events, which may be relevant for performance, and that these changes could be misinterpreted as oscillatory changes. While it is a timely and interesting topic in principle, in the present form, the analytic approach is incomplete. Further, the data offer inadequate support for the conclusions related to theta without demonstrations that the task evokes theta power. Impressions were split, but there was consensus that the Discussion should be tempered and that revisions would improve the manuscript.

Reviewed by eLife

A peptide-neurotensin conjugate that crosses the blood-brain barrier induces pharmacological hypothermia associated with anticonvulsant, neuroprotective, and anti-inflammatory properties following status epilepticus in mice

1. Lotfi Ferhat
2. Rabia Soussi
3. Maxime Masse
4. Grigorios Kyriatzis
5. Stéphane Girard
6. Fanny Gassiot
7. Nicolas Gaudin
8. Mathieu Laurencin
9. Anne Bernard
10. Angélique Bôle
11. Géraldine Ferracci
12. Maria Smirnova
13. François Roman
14. Vincent Dive
15. Salvatore Cisternino
16. Jamal Temsamani
17. Marion David
18. Pascaline Lécorché
19. Guillaume Jacquot
20. Michel Khrestchatisky

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  The authors developed a method to allow a hypothermic agent, neurotensin, to cross the blood-brain barrier so it could potentially protect the brain from seizures and the adverse effects of seizures. The work is important because it is known that cooling the brain can protect it but developing a therapeutic approach based on that knowledge has not been done. The paper is well presented and the data are convincing.

Reviewed by eLife

A Novel Mouse Model for LAMA2 -Related Muscular Dystrophy: Analysis of Molecular Pathogenesis and Clinical Phenotype

1. Dandan Tan
2. Yidan Liu
3. Huaxia Luo
4. Qiang Shen
5. Xingbo Long
6. Luzheng Xu
7. Jieyu Liu
8. Nanbert Zhong
9. Hong Zhang
10. Hui Xiong

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This useful manuscript reports on a new mouse model for LAMA2-MD, a rare but very severe congenital muscular dystrophy; the knockout mice were generated by removing exon3 in the Lama2 gene, which results in a frameshift in exon4 and a premature stop codon. These animals lack any laminin-alpha2 protein and confirm results from previous Lama2 knockout models. Additionally, this study includes transcriptomics data that might be a good resource for the field. However, the experimental evidence supporting the main claims of the manuscript is incomplete, citations of previous Lama2 null mice studies are lacking, and both data presentation and interpretation need improvement.

Reviewed by eLife

Inhibitory basal ganglia nuclei differentially innervate pedunculopontine nucleus subpopulations and evoke opposite motor and valence behaviors.

1. Michel Fallah
2. Kenea C Udobi
3. Aleksandra E Swiatek
4. Chelsea B Scott
5. Rebekah C Evans

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  Fallah et al carefully dissect projections from substantia nigra pars reticulata (SNr) and the globus pallidus externa (GPe) – two key basal ganglia nuclei – to the pedunculopontine nucleus (PPN), a brainstem nucleus that has a central role in motor control. They consider inputs from these two areas onto 3 types of downstream PPN neurons – GABAergic, glutamatergic, and cholinergic neurons – and carefully map connectivity along the rostrocaudal axis of the PPN. Overall, this valuable study provided convincing data on PPN connectivity with two key input structures that will provide a basis for further understanding PPN function.

Reviewed by eLife

The NeuroML ecosystem for standardized multi-scale modeling in neuroscience

1. Ankur Sinha
2. Padraig Gleeson
3. Bóris Marin
4. Salvador Dura-Bernal
5. Sotirios Panagiotou
6. Sharon Crook
7. Matteo Cantarelli
8. Robert C Cannon
9. Andrew P Davison
10. Harsha Gurnani
11. Robin Angus Silver

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important work presents a consolidated overview of the NeuroML2 open community standard and provides convincing evidence for its central role within a broader software ecosystem for the development of neuronal models that are open, shareable, reproducible, and interoperable. A major strength of the work is the continued development over more than two decades to establish, maintain, and adapt this standard to meet the evolving needs of the field. This work is of broad interest to the sub-cellular, cellular, computational, and systems neuroscience communities undertaking studies involving theory, modeling, and simulation.

Reviewed by eLife

Live imaging of excitable axonal microdomains in ankyrin-G-GFP mice

1. Christian Thome
2. Jan Maximilian Janssen
3. Seda Karabulut
4. Claudio Acuna
5. Elisa D'Este
6. Stella J Soyka
7. Konrad Baum
8. Michael Bock
9. Nadja Lehmann
10. Johannes Roos
11. Nikolas A Stevens
12. Masashi Hasegawa
13. Dan A Ganea
14. Chloé M Benoit
15. Jan Gründemann
16. Lia Y Min
17. Kalynn M Bird
18. Christian Schultz
19. Vann Bennett
20. Paul M Jenkins
21. Maren Engelhardt

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  In this valuable paper, the authors created a reporter mouse line in which the Axon Initial Segment (AIS) is intrinsically labeled by an ankyrin-G-GFP fusion protein activated by Cre recombinase, tagging the native Ank3 gene. Using confocal, superresolution, and two-photon microscopy as well as whole-cell patch-clamp recordings in vitro, ex vivo, and in vivo, the authors convincingly document that the subcellular scaffold of the AIS and electrophysiological parameters of labeled cells remain unchanged. They further uncover rapid AIS remodeling following increased network activity in this model system, as well as highly reproducible in vivo labeling of AIS over weeks.

Reviewed by eLife