throwitawayday

Joined 10 years ago

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The question of how neurons find each other to connect was recently studied with experimental connectomics--altering neurons and then mapping their synaptic circuits with electron microscopy--in this paper by Javier Valdes Aleman et al. 2019 https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/697763v1 , using Drosophila's somatosensory axons and central interneurons as a model.

If the OP's website Disqus worked (can't ever get the "post" button for comments after login), the above could have gone straight into the page.

Comment · 7 years ago

Having recently visited the Yellowstone National Park, the situation you describe for the North Sea side of Germany applies but worse, the cell phone data connection being non-existent, and with the added issue that only one hotel offered wifi, and it was out of service for the entire duration of our visit.

Comment · 9 years ago

On 3), the giant fiber is fast but not faster than other descending fibers. If anything, it is more reliable in its ability to signal.

See: https://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v17/n7/full/nn.3741.htm...

Short abstract snippet (the "parallel circuits" are other, non-giant descending neurons that also trigger the escape behavior upon a looming stimulus):

"Intracellular recording of the descending giant fiber (GF) interneuron during head-fixed escape revealed that GF spike timing relative to parallel circuits for escape actions determined which of the two behavioral responses was elicited. The process was well described by a simple model in which the GF circuit has a higher activation threshold than the parallel circuits, but can override ongoing behavior to force a short takeoff. Our findings suggest a neural mechanism for action selection in which relative activation timing of parallel circuits creates the appropriate motor output."

Comment · 9 years ago

On eyes in general: the retina is not like a camera pixel array, rather, it extracts all kinds of features and detects motion:

"Eye smarter than scientists believed: neural computations in circuits of the retina." Gollisch, Tim, and Markus Meister. Neuron 65.2 (2010): 150-164.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0896627309...

Comment · 10 years ago

This could be one case where using a preprint server like the http://biorxiv.org/ would be key. Getting positive peer reviews when peers are opposed in principle is hard: no amount of data will convince them.

That said, she stated to be new to the field. She should have a publication record from work in her prior field of research.

Comment · 10 years ago

The correction:

“Empathy and pro-social behavior in rats” by I. B.-A. Bartal et al. (9 December 2011, p. 1427). On p. 1428, the last full paragraph of column 1 was incorrect. The paragraph should be replaced by this corrected text: “All female rats (6/6) and most male rats (17/24) in the trapped condition became door-openers. Female rats in the trapped condition opened the restrainer door at a shorter latency than males on days 7 to 12 (P < 0.01, MMA, Fig. 3A), consistent with suggestions that females are more empathic than males (7, 12, 13). Furthermore, female rats were also more active than males in the trapped condition (P < 0.001, ANOVA) but not in the empty condition (Fig. 3B).”