Research articles

The authors investigate grid cell dynamics after removal of a border between two environments. Near the transition between environments, grid fields changed location, resulting in local spatial periodicity and continuity between the original maps.

Grid cell activity may subserve path integration, but a direct link is lacking. The authors selectively disrupt retro-hippocampal region grid cell activity and show that disrupted grid cell firing impairs performance in a path integration task.

Long-lasting synaptic plasticity is regarded as a mechanism for learning and memory. Using genetically engineered mice in which the C-terminal domains of AMPA receptor subtypes are switched, the authors reveal that GluA1 and GluA2 differentially regulate synaptic plasticity and contribute to different forms of learning.

The authors show that Munc13-1 molecules form multiple supramolecular self-assemblies that serve as vesicular release sites. Having multiple Munc13-1 assemblies affords a stable synaptic weight, which confers robustness of synaptic computation.

The authors live-image zebrafish myelin sheath Ca²⁺ activity in vivo and find that high-amplitude long-duration Ca²⁺ transients precede calpain-dependent sheath retractions while frequent low-amplitude short-duration transients drive sheath growth.

Synaptotagmin-1 (Syt1) controls synaptic vesicle–membrane attachment activities via its C2B domain. These correlate with release synchronization and synaptic short-term facilitation, revealing a mechanism for Syt1-mediated synchronous release.

Myelin formed by oligodendrocytes enables rapid, energy-efficient information transmission in CNS, but its development is unclear. The authors show that the rate of intracellular calcium transients regulates elongation of developing myelin sheaths.

The mosquito-borne ZIKA virus triggers microcephaly in human newborns. The authors report that the microcephaly results from induction of endoplasmic stress that interferes with generation and survival of projection neurons in the cerebral cortex.

A genome-wide association study of delay discounting (DD) on 23,127 subjects found that genotype accounted for 12% of variance in DD; the DD genetic signature overlapped with ADHD, schizophrenia, depression, smoking, personality, cognition and weight.

Using single-cell RNA-sequencing, the authors record snapshots of the dynamic sensory-experience-dependent transcriptome across all cell types of the visual cortex in mice exposed to a light stimulus. The authors note diverse cell-type-specific programs in pyramidal neuron subtypes and robust non-neuronal responses that may regulate experience-dependent neurovascular coupling and myelination.

The authors present a new computational approach to automatically annotate, analyze, visualize and easily share whole-brain datasets at cellular resolution, based on a scale-invariant and interactive mouse brain reference atlas. The authors applied this framework to define the organization and cocaine-induced activity of corticostriatal circuits.

The protein composition of excitatory synapses differs in the areas of the human neocortex controlling language, emotion and other behaviors. This neocortical postsynaptic proteome data resource can be used to link genetics to brain imaging and behavior.

Humans can deliberately control the timing of their actions but the neural mechanisms underlying such control are largely unknown. In this article, Wang, Narain and their colleagues report that such flexibility emerges in rhesus monkeys from the ability of their brain to flexibly control the speed at which cortical responses unfold in time.

Most species exhibit instinctive risk-avoidance, e.g., lab mice avoid predator smells despite having never encountered predators. Here the authors show how innate risk-avoidance arises from accumbal dopamine receptor neurons tuned by orexin signals.

Like all terrestrial mammals, humans emit body odors that subtly communicate emotions. This study suggests that adults with autism may be misreading these chemical signals and that this may explain a portion of their social difficulties.

Apicco and colleagues show that reducing TIA1 inhibits tau-mediated neurodegeneration and improves survival in a mouse model of tauopathy. This rescue occurs with a transition in tau aggregation from oligomeric to fibrillar forms of tau. These findings suggest a key role for RNA binding proteins in the pathophysiology of tau.

Experience-dependent plasticity in the visual system has widely been considered to be exclusively cortical. Using chronic two-photon Ca²⁺imaging of individual thalamic boutons, Jaepel et al. now report that dLGN cells projecting to mouse visual cortex show pronounced ocular dominance plasticity after monocular deprivation.

The authors show that oxytocin-receptor-expressing neurons in the parabrachial nucleus are key regulators of fluid homeostasis that suppress fluid intake when activated, but do not decrease food intake after fasting or salt intake after salt depletion.

The authors show that unlike body sensory neurons, craniofacial nociceptive neurons directly synapse with noxious-stimulus-activated lateral parabrachial neurons (PB_L), which in turn project to multiple limbic centers processing emotions and affects. This monosynaptic pathway is both sufficient and necessary for craniofacial-pain-activated aversive behaviors.

The authors develop a methods suite for millisecond-precise, single-cell-resolution control of neural activity through protein engineering of novel opsin/trafficking sequence combinations, as well as optimized holographic two-photon optics.