美国普林斯顿大学Mala Murthy研究小组发现，听觉活动在果蝇的中枢大脑中是多样且广泛的。2020年11月23日，《自然—神经科学》杂志在线发表了这项成果。

研究人员介绍了精确横跨大脑的体积神经成像新方法，用于表征果蝇整个中央大脑的听觉活动，并在试验、个人和性别之间进行比较。研究人员发现听觉活动存在于大多数中枢大脑区域和响应其他方式的神经元中。听觉的反应在时间上是多种多样的，但是大多数活动都根据求爱歌曲的功能进行了调整。在早期的机械感知区域中各种试验和动物的听觉反应都被定型，并变得更加可变，而且这种可变性在很大程度上与正在进行的运动无关。

这项研究强调了使用无偏倚全脑方法绘制感觉活动功能组织的能力。

据悉，人们通常从受体神经元开始并依循进入大脑的神经元来研究感觉途径。但是，这会导致对活动分析的偏差。

附：英文原文

Title: Auditory activity is diverse and widespread throughout the central brain of Drosophila

Author: Diego A. Pacheco, Stephan Y. Thiberge, Eftychios Pnevmatikakis, Mala Murthy

Issue&Volume: 2020-11-23

Abstract: Sensory pathways are typically studied by starting at receptor neurons and following postsynaptic neurons into the brain. However, this leads to a bias in analyses of activity toward the earliest layers of processing. Here, we present new methods for volumetric neural imaging with precise across-brain registration to characterize auditory activity throughout the entire central brain of Drosophila and make comparisons across trials, individuals and sexes. We discover that auditory activity is present in most central brain regions and in neurons responsive to other modalities. Auditory responses are temporally diverse, but the majority of activity is tuned to courtship song features. Auditory responses are stereotyped across trials and animals in early mechanosensory regions, becoming more variable at higher layers of the putative pathway, and this variability is largely independent of ongoing movements. This study highlights the power of using an unbiased, brain-wide approach for mapping the functional organization of sensory activity. Pacheco et al. present new methods for the unbiased recording and cataloging of sensory activity throughout the Drosophila brain and across trials and individuals. They find auditory activity is temporally diverse but present in neurons throughout nearly all central brain regions.

DOI: 10.1038/s41593-020-00743-y

Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-020-00743-y