Active phytoextraction of toluene shifts the microbiome and enhances degradation capacity in hybrid poplar.

Hybrid poplars are widely recognized for their effectiveness in remediating subsurface aromatic hydrocarbon contaminants, including benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylene isomers (BTEX). While BTEX compounds are frequently found in the transpiration streams of poplars at contaminated sites, the microbial dynamics within these trees, particularly in response to hydrocarbon exposure, remain underexplored. This study utilized high-throughput amplicon sequencing to investigate the trunk microbiome in hybrid poplars at a field-scale toluene phytoremediation site.

Future views on neuroscience and AI.

The relationship between neuroscience and artificial intelligence (AI) has evolved rapidly over the past decade. These two areas of study influence and stimulate each other. We invited experts to share their perspectives on this exciting intersection, focusing on current achievements, unsolved questions, and future directions.

Temporal multiplexing of perception and memory codes in IT cortex.

A central assumption of neuroscience is that long-term memories are represented by the same brain areas that encode sensory stimuli. Neurons in inferotemporal (IT) cortex represent the sensory percept of visual objects using a distributed axis code. Whether and how the same IT neural population represents the long-term memory of visual objects remains unclear.