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SUMMARY:Motor cortex circuits for learned movements - Takaki Komiyama 
DTSTART:20231013T110000Z
DTEND:20231013T120000Z
UID:TALK207352@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Elisa Galliano
DESCRIPTION:Animals constantly modify their behavior through experience. F
 lexible behavior is key to our ability to adapt to the ever-changing envir
 onment. My laboratory is interested in studying the activity of neuronal e
 nsembles in behaving animals\, and how it changes with learning.\n\nWe hav
 e recently set up a paradigm where mice learn to associate sensory informa
 tion (two different odors) to motor outputs (lick vs no-lick) under head-f
 ixation. We combined this with two-photon calcium imaging\, which can moni
 tor the activity of a microcircuit of many tens of neurons simultaneously 
 from a small area of the brain. Imaging the motor cortex during the learni
 ng of this task revealed neurons with diverse task-related response types.
  Intriguingly\, different response types were spatially intermingled\; eve
 n immediately adjacent neurons often had very different response types. As
  the mouse learned the task under the microscope\, the activity coupling o
 f neurons with similar response types specifically increased\, even though
  they are intermingled with neurons with dissimilar response types. This s
 uggests that intermingled subnetworks of functionally-related neurons form
  in a learning-related way\, an observation that became possible with our 
 cutting-edge technique combining imaging and behavior.\n\nWe are working t
 o extend this study. How plastic are neuronal microcircuits during other f
 orms of learning? How plastic are they in other parts of the brain? What a
 re the cellular and molecular mechanisms of the microcircuit plasticity? A
 re the observed activity and plasticity required for learning? How does th
 e activity of identified individual neurons change over days to weeks? We 
 are asking these questions\, combining a variety of techniques including i
 n vivo two-photon imaging\, optogenetics\, electrophysiology\, genetics an
 d behavior.
LOCATION:Bryan Matthew’s Seminar Room\, Physiology Building\, Downing Si
 te
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