The lack of physiological recordings from Caenorhabditis elegans embryos stands in stark contrast to the comprehensive anatomical and gene expression datasets already available. Using light-sheet fluorescence microscopy to address the challenges associated with functional imaging at this developmental stage, we recorded calcium dynamics in muscles and neurons and developed analysis strategies to relate activity and movement. In muscles, we found that the initiation of twitching was associated with a spreading calcium wave in a dorsal muscle bundle. Correlated activity in muscle bundles was linked with early twitching and eventual coordinated movement. To identify neuronal correlates of behavior, we monitored brainwide activity with subcellular resolution and identified a particularly active cell associated with muscle contractions. Finally, imaging neurons of a well-defined adult motor circuit, we found that reversals in the eggshell correlated with calcium transients in AVA interneurons.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bpj.2017.02.035 | DOI Listing |
Lab Anim (NY)
January 2025
Werner Reichardt Centre for Integrative Neuroscience and Institute for Neurobiology, University of Tuebingen, Tuebingen, Germany.
Two methods dominate the way that zebrafish larvae are euthanized after experimental procedures: anesthetic overdose and rapid cooling. Although MS-222 is easy to apply, this anesthetic takes about a minute to act and fish show aversive reactions and interindividual differences, limiting its reliability. Rapid cooling kills larvae after several hours and is not listed as an approved method in the relevant European Union directive.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Neurosci
January 2025
Department of Integrative Anatomy, Nagoya City University Graduate School of Medicinal Sciences.
Neurons in the cerebral cortex and hippocampus discharge synchronously in brain state-dependent manner to transfer information. Published studies have highlighted the temporal coordination of neuronal activities between the hippocampus and a neocortical area, however, how the spatial extent of neocortical activity relates to hippocampal activity remains partially unknown. We imaged mesoscopic neocortical activity while recording hippocampal local field potentials in anesthetized and unanesthetized GCaMP-expressing transgenic mice.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFZebrafish models of genetic epilepsy benefit from the ability to assess disease-relevant knock-out alleles with numerous tools, including genetically encoded calcium indicators (GECIs) and hypopigmentation alleles to improve visualization. However, there may be unintended effects of these manipulations on the phenotypes under investigation. There is also debate regarding the use of stable loss-of-function (LoF) alleles in zebrafish, due to genetic compensation (GC).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBrief monocular deprivation during a developmental critical period, but not thereafter, alters the receptive field properties (tuning) of neurons in visual cortex, but the characteristics of neural circuitry that permit this experience-dependent plasticity are largely unknown. We performed repeated calcium imaging at neuronal resolution to track the tuning properties of populations of excitatory layer 2/3 neurons in mouse visual cortex during or after the critical period, as well as in mutant mice that sustain critical-period plasticity as adults. The instability of tuning for populations of neurons was greater in juvenile mice and adult mutant mice.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRecurrent neural networks (RNNs) have emerged as a prominent tool for modeling cortical function, and yet their conventional architecture is lacking in physiological and anatomical fidelity. In particular, these models often fail to incorporate two crucial biological constraints: i) Dale's law, i.e.
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