🧠 New #preprint by Komi et al. (2025): Neural #manifolds that orchestrate walking and stopping. Using #Neuropixels recordings from the lumbar spinal cord of freely walking rats, they show that #locomotion arises from rotational #PopulationDynamics within a low-dimensional limit-cycle #manifold. When walking stops, the dynamics collapse into a postural manifold of stable fixed points, each encoding a distinct pose.
🧠 Using #Neuropixels recordings + deep-learning dynamics (FINDR), Luo et al. (2025) show that rat #decisionmaking switches from input-driven to autonomous network regimes mid-trial. After this nTc point, new sensory evidence no longer affects choice. Highlights fronto-striatal division of labor and constrains #AttractorModels.
🧠 New preprint by Kashefi et al. (2025): High-density #Neuropixels recordings in monkeys reveal compositional #NeuralDynamics in #MotorCortex. A posture subspace anchors fixed points, rotational dynamics link them to generate movement, and a uniform shift tracks trial state. Recurrent models show this geometry emerges only when controlling a full arm, suggesting posture-dependent control as a core principle:
🌍 https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.09.04.674069v1
🧠 New landmark study “A #brain-wide map of #NeuralActivity during complex #behaviour” by the #InternationalBrainLaboratory (Angelaki et al., 2025): >600,000 #neurons across 279 regions in 139 mice, unified across 12 labs with #Neuropixels probes.
#DecisionMaking isn’t confined to single hubs but distributed across the brain, incl. #sensory, #motor & #reward areas, showing how #cognitive processes emerge from brain-wide #dynamics.
🌍 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025-09235-0
The sound of cells in the brain just doesn’t get old! It’s how I fell in love with #neuroscience 🧠🧪👩🏻🔬
Celebrating small victories - first #neuropixels recordings in the lab. Congrats to the team that made it happen!
#PostdocJob from the #RuedigerLab at #UCL, London:
"I’m excited to share that we have an opening for a postdoctoral position in my lab at University College London. This role is funded by the Wellcome Trust and offers a unique chance to join our team as we work to understand how cortical and subcortical visual circuits work together to turn visual signals into learned actions in mice.
In this role, you will:
• Design and perform innovative experiments in head-fixed and freely moving mice
• Use advanced techniques like #Neuropixels recordings and two-photon calcium imaging to monitor and analyze brain activity
• Collaborate closely with a diverse team of experimentalists and computational neuroscientists
• Contribute to the preparation and dissemination of our research findings through publications and conference presentations
This is a fantastic opportunity to make original contributions to our growing research group. If you have a strong background in in vivo physiology, mouse behavioral studies, and relevant data analysis - and you’re eager to expand your skills while playing a key role in our projects - I’d love to hear from you.
For further details, including the full job description, please check out:
Job Ad
I look forward to the possibility of you joining our team.
Sarah"
#NeuroESC #JournalClub
Reading Mental exploration of future choices during immobility theta oscillations
If you've read it, will you let me know what you think?
The authors look at #ThetaSequences in a working memory task in a radial arm maze. They find theta during immobility (makes sense, e.g. we saw that in our two-goals task). They also find that theta sequences might preferentially represent the next goal (also makes sense, e.g. Hippocampal theta sequences reflect current goals)!
I have only done a quick reading so far, but am confused by a few points:
the decoded algorithm itself includes a ' position transition matrix' which seems like it would bias decoding towards realistic trajectories that the rat is about to do??? (but I probably missed something)
also, this study is very related to this other paper, which is not discussed or even cited (😕 ):
Assembly Responses of Hippocampal CA1 Place Cells Predict Learned Behavior in Goal-Directed Spatial Tasks on the Radial Eight-Arm Maze #CsisvariLab
Let me know what you think!
Mental exploration enables flexible evaluation of potential future choices, guiding decision-making without requiring direct real-world iterations. Although the hippocampus is known to be active while imagining the future, the precise mechanisms that support mental exploration of future choices remain unclear. In the hippocampus, the theta rhythm (4-12 Hz) is prevalent during movement and supports memory coding during real-world exploration by organizing neuronal activity patterns into short virtual path segments (theta sequences) around the rat’s location. We observed these theta-related neural activity patterns during movement in a hippocampus-dependent working memory task and also, unexpectedly, theta oscillations and theta-related neural activity during immobility. Compared to standard theta sequences during movement, theta sequences during immobility differed in that they occurred at a shifted theta phase and preferentially represented remote locations, in particular the next choice in the working memory task. Coding for future locations was also observed during awake sharp wave ripple, but these short-lasting events occurred rarely and were biased toward frequently visited locations. Therefore, our findings suggest that recurring bouts of theta oscillations during immobility, which are also observed in primates and humans, support the cognitive demands of mental exploration in the hippocampal network and facilitate ongoing predictions of future choices. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest.
Every time I heard that the vertebrate retina does not receive any feedback from the central brain I expressed scepticism, and was told repeatedly that no, feedback fibers running backwards along the optic nerve were never found.
Now*, Sylvia Schröder et al. reports that:
"Arousal modulates retinal output", Schröder et al. 2020 https://www.cell.com/neuron/fulltext/S0896-6273(20)30318-4
Recordings with neuropixels probes on the optic tract of the mouse showed changes in retinal ganglion cell (RGC) activity (the output neurons of the retina whose axons make up the optical tract) in concordance with the arousal state of the mouse. They also measured activity of RGC axon boutons in the superior colliculus.
What a fantastic piece of work.
* for long values of "now".
What do #Electrophysiologists who record raw data from many channels (#NeuroPixels, #Hyperdrives…) do for data backup and storage? I just bought 2 x 4Tb external drives and it looks like they won’t be enough (at all). Is there a cheap and reliable AND huge storage way to do this?
Fabrizio Musacchio
Theresa Desrochers
El Duvelle Neuro
Albert Cardona
Enny