Gene expression in male and female stickleback from populations with convergent and divergent throat coloration.

Understanding of genetic mechanisms underlying variation in sexual dichromatism remains limited, especially for carotenoid-based colors. We addressed this knowledge gap in a gene expression study with threespine stickleback. We compared male and female throat tissues across five populations, including two in which female red coloration has evolved convergently.

Polymorphism promotes edge utilization by marsh crabs.

Understanding how habitat edges affect ecological processes is crucial given widespread and increasing modifications to natural landscapes. Resource specialization is a key factor affecting among-species edge responses, but we know little about how intraspecific resource use variation mediates edge utilization. Here, we integrate stomach content analysis, geometric morphometrics and feeding experiments to explore the role of resource polymorphism in mediating marsh crab (Panopeus obesus) foraging within the marsh-oyster reef boundary.

Decoding and perturbing decision states in real time.

In dynamic environments, subjects often integrate multiple samples of a signal and combine them to reach a categorical judgment. The process of deliberation can be described by a time-varying decision variable (DV), decoded from neural population activity, that predicts a subject's upcoming decision. Within single trials, however, there are large moment-to-moment fluctuations in the DV, the behavioural significance of which is unclear.

Differential encoding in prefrontal cortex projection neuron classes across cognitive tasks.

Single-cell transcriptomics has been widely applied to classify neurons in the mammalian brain, while systems neuroscience has historically analyzed the encoding properties of cortical neurons without considering cell types. Here we examine how specific transcriptomic types of mouse prefrontal cortex (PFC) projection neurons relate to axonal projections and encoding properties across multiple cognitive tasks. We found that most types projected to multiple targets, and most targets received projections from multiple types, except PFC→PAG (periaqueductal gray).