Topic: silicon probe recordings

During NREM sleep, the brain is in a self-organized excitable regime in which alternations between spiking and near cessation of spiking propagate along the forebrain, termed slow oscillations (SOs) or UP and DOWN states in the neocortex, and sharpwave-ripples (SPW-Rs) in the hippocampus (Levenstein 2019). Both gain and loss of function studies have demonstrated the importance of tight temporal coordination between SOs and SPW-Rs for systems consolidation. However, where and how this coordination is spontaneously achieved is unknown, despite being essential for understanding whole-brain mechan

How does the brain record individual experiences, and recall them to adaptively guide future behavior? This ‘episodic-like’ memory regime involves the hippocampus, but it has been difficult to identify specific neural signatures with recollection of specific memories, hindering a mechanistic understanding of recall. Studying food caching behaviors may provide a clearer picture. Scatter hoarding species, such as chickadees, cache individual food items, and use hippocampal-dependent memory to later retrieve them. However tools for behavioral and neural measurement in chickadees are underdevelope

Cognitive flexibility is critical for enabling humans and animals to maintain and maximize rewarding outcomes in a changing environment, and often compromised in various psychiatric conditions including Schizophrenia (Lotus Thai, et al, 2019; Zhu, Ho-wai So, et al, 2021). Prefrontal cortex (PFC) and basal ganglia (BG) are both important brain systems in establishing and switching between flexible goal-directed strategies, and repetitive behaviours (Merre, et al, 2018; Hart, Balleine et al, 2014). The direct anatomical connection between PFC and striatum (STR; the input nucleus of BG) is consid

The hippocampus is known to play a major role in the storage and recall of information depending on various forms of activity dependent synaptic plasticity. Mossy fiber synapses between the axons of dentate gyrus (DG) granule cells and CA3 pyramidal cells (Mf-CA3 synapses) display a high dynamic range of presynaptic plasticity which endow these synaptic connections with detonator properties. The pattern of action potential firing, in the form of high frequency bursts in the DG, strongly controls the amplitude of synaptic responses and information transfer to CA3. Presynaptic short-term plastic