Topic: context-dependent behavior

Humans and other animals often perform similar actions in different contexts. For instance, we use different criteria when judging whether an apple or avocado are ripe, but use very similar motor actions to move the fruit into our basket if we select it. We hypothesize that this ability to context switch is facilitated by functional modularity within brain regions, such as the specialization of a subpopulation of inferotemporal cortex neurons for face relative to non-face features. However, the link between this functional modularity and context-dependent behavior is not fully understood. Here

Sequenced behaviors, including locomotion, reaching, and vocalization, are patterned differently in different contexts, enabling animals to adjust to their current environments. However, how contextual information shapes neural activity to flexibly alter action patterning is not yet understood. Prior work indicates such flexibility could be achieved via parallel motor circuits, with differing sensitivities to sensory context; instead we demonstrate here how a single neural pathway operates in two different regimes dependent on recent sensory history. We leverage the Drosophila song production