The Canine Brains Project has finally joined Mastodon! Here's our #introduction! 🐶 🧠 🎓
We are scientists from Harvard's Hecht Lab who are studying dog #neuroscience and #behavior. We are interested in how #genes, #neuroanatomy, #dogtraining, and lifetime experiences shape dogs' minds. We also study how dog brains and behaviors #evolve.
#dog #dogsofmastodon #evolution #EvolutionaryBiology #evolutionaryneuroscience #animalbehavior #ethology #MRI #neuroimaging #workingdogs
@caninebrainsproject at some point I am absolutely dying to take a deep look at herding breeds in the context of decision-making and neurodivergence. Obviously nothing is a perfect parallel but I genuinely think there's some incredibly cool stuff lurking there that no one has really gotten around to parsing.
V excited to see what comes out of the project!
Humans have bred different lineages of domestic dogs for different tasks such as hunting, herding, guarding, or companionship. These behavioral differences must be the result of underlying neural differences, but surprisingly, this topic has gone largely unexplored. The current study examined whether and how selective breeding by humans has altered the gross organization of the brain in dogs. We assessed regional volumetric variation in MRI studies of 62 male and female dogs of 33 breeds. Neuroanatomical variation is plainly visible across breeds. This variation is distributed nonrandomly across the brain. A whole-brain, data-driven independent components analysis established that specific regional subnetworks covary significantly with each other. Variation in these networks is not simply the result of variation in total brain size, total body size, or skull shape. Furthermore, the anatomy of these networks correlates significantly with different behavioral specialization(s) such as sight hunting, scent hunting, guarding, and companionship. Importantly, a phylogenetic analysis revealed that most change has occurred in the terminal branches of the dog phylogenetic tree, indicating strong, recent selection in individual breeds. Together, these results establish that brain anatomy varies significantly in dogs, likely due to human-applied selection for behavior. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Dog breeds are known to vary in cognition, temperament, and behavior, but the neural origins of this variation are unknown. In an MRI-based analysis, we found that brain anatomy covaries significantly with behavioral specializations such as sight hunting, scent hunting, guarding, and companionship. Neuroanatomical variation is not simply driven by brain size, body size, or skull shape, and is focused in specific networks of regions. Nearly all of the identified variation occurs in the terminal branches of the dog phylogenetic tree, indicating strong, recent selection in individual breeds. These results indicate that through selective breeding, humans have significantly altered the brains of different lineages of domestic dogs in different ways.
Canine cognitive dysfunction syndrome (CCDS) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder in senior dogs that is mainly associated with decreased ability to learn and respond to stimuli. It is commonly under-diagnosed because behavioral changes are often attributed to the natural process of aging. In the present study, we used for the first time a comprehensive approach enabling early diagnosis of canine patients with mild cognitive disorders (MiCI). We included CAnine DEmentia Scale (CADES) questionnaires, biochemical parameters, and biomarkers in blood serum, and correlated them with post-mortem histopathological changes. The CADES questionnaires enabled us to identify MiCI dogs developing changes mainly in domains corresponding to social interaction and spatial orientation, which seems to be crucial for delineating early cognitive disorders. Biochemical analyses in these dogs showed slightly elevated liver enzyme parameters (AST and ALT) and significantly decreased sodium and chloride levels in blood serum. Furthermore, we describe for the first time a significant increase of neurofilament light chain (NFL) in blood serum of MiCI dogs, compared to normal aging seniors and young controls, but no changes in TAU protein and amyloid-β (Aβ42) peptide levels. In canine brains with cognitive impairment, amyloid plaques of mainly diffuse and dense types were detected. Furthermore, activated microglia with amoeboid body and dystrophic processes occurred, in some cases with sphero...
Canine Brains Project
rsp
Erin Giglio
Damian Dalle Nogare
Sjors Scheres
Aviva Gary
Pup In Progress Dog Training