Fig. 1

mPOA neural dynamics during social behaviors. a Schematics of the fiber photometry experiment. Fluorescent signals were recorded using an integrated setup. At the bottom, example traces of ΔF/F signals with behavioral annotations underneath. b Heat map representation of ΔF/F signals around social investigations (SI) averaged at the animal level with time “0” aligned to the onset of the behavior. Scale shown on the right applies to all heat maps in this figure. c Example heat map representations of ΔF/F signals around events of SI alone (top) or those that were followed by mount (bottom). Light blue lines in the bottom panel denote the onset of mount for each event. d, e Quantification of ΔF/F signals associated with SI alone or those followed by mount in males (left) and females (right) in d, and mount followed by pelvic thrust or not in males (left) and females (right) in e. Lines indicate mean values and the shaded area standard error of mean (s.e.m.). Vertical black bars in d denote when mount behaviors were initiated on average. Green dots underneath indicate a significant difference between the two lines at the corresponding time point by unpaired t test with a false discovery rate of 0.05. d SI, N = 16 males and 16 females; Mount, N = 13 males and 10 females; e N = 6 males and 4 females. f Significant correlation between total number of Ca²⁺ transients and the total number of mount between the first and last mounting behavior in a trial by Pearson’s correlation. N = 11 trials for males and 8 trials for females. g Comparison of numbers of Ca²⁺ transients (left) and numbers of mount (right) in f between males and females at the animal level. N = 8 males and 8 females. Unpaired t test. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01. h, i Heat map representations of ΔF/F signals around pup contacts (h) and pup retrieval (i) at the animal level with time “0” aligned to the onset of the behavior. j, k Quantification of ΔF/F signals associated with pup contact and pup retrieval in males (left) and females (right) in j and crouching behavior in females in k