Topic: somatosensation

Rodents rely heavily on somatosensation to explore their environment. The primary somatosensory cortex (S1) contributes to the encoding and perception of tactile stimuli. Although S1 neurons also receive non-tactile inputs, it is unclear whether S1 similarly encodes non-tactile sensory-based behaviour. Whole-cell patch clamp recordings were used to investigate the voltage response of layer 2/3 (L2/3) pyramidal neurons in S1 during performance in either a tactile-based or auditory-based association task in mice. A robust and sustained voltage response was evoked in L2/3 pyramidal neurons during

Olfaction is considered the evolutionarily oldest sense, which together with somatosensation, is crucial for neonatal well-being before audition and vision start engaging the brain. Using anatomical and functional approaches, we reveal that olfactory-driven activity propagates to a large part of the cortex during the first postnatal week, and enhances whisker-evoked activation of primary whisker somatosensory cortex (wS1). This effect disappears in adult mice, due to the loss of neonatal excitatory connectivity from olfactory cortex to wS1. By performing developmental olfactory-deprivation and