Neuroscience

Sex chromosome gene expression associated with vocal learning following hormonal manipulation in female zebra finches

1. Matthew Davenport
2. Ha Na Choe
3. Hiroaki Matsunami
4. Erich Jarvis

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study is valuable as it provides information about the genes regulated by sex hormone treatment in song nuclei and other brain regions and suggests candidate genes that might induce sexual dimorphism in the zebra finch brain. The analysis presented is thorough and detailed. Whereas the evidence for gene regulation by hormone treatment is well supported, the evidence for an association of those genes with song learning (as written in the title) is incompletely supported as no manipulation of song learning or song analysis was conducted.

Reviewed by eLife

Chemogenetic stimulation of phrenic motor output and diaphragm activity

1. Ethan S Benevides
2. Prajwal P Thakre
3. Sabhya Rana
4. Michael D Sunshine
5. Victoria N Jensen
6. Karim Oweiss
7. David D Fuller

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  The authors report that chemogenetic methods targeting the ventral cervical spinal cord can be used to increase phrenic inspiratory motor output and subsequent diaphragm EMG activity and ventilation in rodents. These findings are important because they are a necessary first step towards using chemogenetic methods to drive inspiratory activity in disorders in which motor neurons are compromised, such as spinal injury and degenerative disease. The data are convincing, with rigorous assessments of phrenic inspiratory activity and its ability to drive the diaphragm and subsequent ventilation, as well as assessments of DREADD expression.

Reviewed by eLife

Different roles of D1/D2 medium spiny neurons in the nucleus accumbens in pair bond formation of male mandarin voles

1. Lizi Zhang
2. Yishan Qu
3. Larry J Young
4. Wenjuan Hou
5. Limin Liu
6. Jing Liu
7. Yuqian Wang
8. Lu Li
9. Xing Guo
10. Yin Li
11. Caihong Huang
12. Zijian Lv
13. Yi-Tong Li
14. Rui Jia
15. Ting Lian
16. Hao Feng
17. Hui Qiao
18. Zhixiong He
19. Fa-Dao Tai

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important study advances our understanding of the role of dopamine in modulating pair bonding in mandarin voles by examining dopamine signaling within the nucleus accumbens across various social stimuli using state-of-the-art causal perturbations. The evidence supporting the findings is compelling, particularly cutting-edge approaches for measuring dopamine release as well as the activity of dopamine receptor populations during social bonding. Some concerns remain about the statistical analyses.

Reviewed by eLife

Synaptic cell adhesion molecule Cdh6 identifies a class of sensory neurons with novel functions in colonic motility

1. Julieta Gomez-Frittelli
2. Gabrielle Frederique Devienne
3. Lee Travis
4. Melinda A Kyloh
5. Xin Duan
6. Tim J Hibberd
7. Nick J Spencer
8. John R Huguenard
9. Julia A Kaltschmidt

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important study characterizes the molecular signatures and function of a type of enteric neuron (IPAN) in the mouse colon, identifying molecular markers (Cdh6 and Cdh8) for these cells. A battery of compelling and comprehensive experimental findings suggests data from other species are likely translatable to mice, bridging the abundant literature from humans and other mammals into this experimentally tractable animal model. This work will be of interest to scientists studying the motor control of the colon and more generally the enteric neuromuscular system.

Reviewed by eLife

Afadin sorts different retinal neuron types into accurate cellular layers

1. Matthew R Lum
2. Sachin Patel
3. Hannah K Graham
4. Mengya Zhao
5. Yujuan Yi
6. Liang Li
7. Melissa Yao
8. Anna La Torre
9. Luca Della Santina
10. Ying Han
11. Yang Hu
12. Derek S Welsbie
13. Xin Duan

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study demonstrates the critical role of Afadin on the generation and maintenance of complex cellular layers in the mouse retina. The data are solid, which provides important insights into how cell-adhesion molecules contribute to retinal organization. However, further investigations are needed to clarify the mechanisms underlying the cellular disorganization phenotype in the retina and axonal projection to the brain.

Reviewed by eLife

Adult neurogenesis through glial transdifferentiation in a CNS injury paradigm

1. Sergio Casas-Tinto
2. Nuria Garcia-Guillen
3. María Losada-Perez

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  In this work, the authors use a Drosophila melanogaster adult ventral nerve cord injury model extending and confirming previous observations. This important study reveals key aspects of adult neural plasticity. Taking advantage of several genetic reporter and fate tracing tools, the authors provide solid evidence for different forms of glial plasticity, that are increased upon injury. The significance of the generated cell types under homeostatic conditions and in response to injury remains to be further explored and open up new avenues of research.

Reviewed by eLife

Proactive distractor suppression in early visual cortex

1. David Richter
2. Dirk van Moorselaar
3. Jan Theeuwes

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important and well-written study uses functional neuroimaging in human observers to provide compelling evidence that activity in the early visual cortex is suppressed at locations that are frequently occupied by a task-irrelevant but salient item. This suppression appears to be general to any kind of stimulus and also occurs in advance of any item actually appearing. The work will be of great interest to psychologists and neuroscientists examining attention, perception, learning and prediction.

Reviewed by eLife

An Alzheimer’s disease-associated common regulatory variant in a PTK2B intron alters microglial function

1. Erica Bello
2. Kathleen Long
3. Sho Iwama
4. Juliette Steer
5. Sarah Cooper
6. Kaur Alasoo
7. Natsuhiko Kumasaka
8. Jeremy Schwartzentruber
9. Nikolaos I Panousis
10. Andrew Bassett

Reviewed by Review Commons

Perceptual and attentional impairments of conscious access involve distinct neural mechanisms despite equal task performance

1. Samuel Noorman
2. Timo Stein
3. Johannes Jacobus Fahrenfort
4. Simon van Gaal

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important study provides new insights into the mechanisms that underlie perceptual and attentional impairments of conscious access. The paper presents convincing evidence of a dissociation between the early stages of low-level perception, which are impermeable to perceptual or attentional impairments, and subsequent stages of visual integration which are susceptible to perceptual impairment but resilient to attentional manipulations. This study will be of interest to scientists working on visual perception and consciousness.

Reviewed by eLife

Multi-dimensional social relationships shape social attention in monkeys

1. Sainan Liu
2. Jiepin Huang
3. Suhao Chen
4. Michael L Platt
5. Yan Yang

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study examined how multidimensional social relationships influence social attention in rhesus macaques, linking individual and group-level behaviors to attentional processes. The findings that oxytocin altered social attention and its relationship to both social tendencies and dyadic relationships are important, as recent technological advances allow for the exploration of neuronal activities and mechanisms in free-moving macaques. This work is convincing and will be of interest to those studying the interplay between social dynamics and information processing in primates.

Reviewed by eLife