Search

An analysis of behavioural, eco-morphological and genomic data in 60 species of Lake Tanganyika cichlids reveals a remarkable diversity of temporal activity patterns across species, suggesting that temporal niche partitioning may have played a role in the adaptive diversification of this group.

Whether paternal pre-conceptual SARS-CoV-2 infection impacts sperm RNA content, or effects offspring phenotypes, has not been previously investigated. Here authors report changes in sperm noncoding RNAs in SARS-CoV-2 infected sires and increased anxiety-like behaviors in offspring.

A two-phase machine-learning-based tool making use of high-throughput experimentation is introduced to examine the connections between chemical and protein sequence space and predict productive biocatalytic reactions among substrate and enzyme pairs.

In Drosophila, coherent slow-wave activity between sleep-promoting and locomotion-promoting neural networks provides a brain state structure that allows for quiescent behaviours.

Quantitative analysis of Caenorhabditis elegans chemosensory behavior is achieved in a structured arena with microfluidic delivery of stimuli with precise spatial and temporal control. Also in this issue, Swierczek et al. report software for real-time behavioral analysis in worms.

Antarctica is increasingly popular as a site for tourism and scientific research. The growth of marine traffic and the presence of major research stations have increased the anthropogenic deposition of heavy metals into this fragile ecosystem.

How do neural circuits evolve to encode new social behaviors? Here we show that in Drosophila santomea, females signal their sexual receptivity by spreading wings in response to male songs, and this recently originated social behavior evolved through the actualization of a pre-existing latent circuit.

A Middle Triassic diapsid is presented that has a distinctive crest consisting of integumentary appendages that are structurally distinct from avemetatarsalian feathers.

Lateral diffusion of receptors between synaptic and extrasynaptic sites is known to mediate plasticity. Hausrat et al. show that diffusion of α5-containing GABA_Areceptors is controlled by phosphorylation of the extrasynaptic anchoring protein Radixin, and reveal a role for Radixin in learning and memory.

Profiling transcriptional crosstalk between promoters and cell-type-specific enhancers allows large gene cargo delivery.

Two halting mechanisms, ‘walk-OFF’ and ‘brake’, are shown to be engaged by distinct neural circuits in Drosophila, in a context dependent manner.

Birds have an excellent ability to learn to discriminate harmless insects from those that they mimic on the basis of subtle differences in appearance.

Nematode bacterial symbionts were evolved in vitro to resist insect-sequestered plant toxins to improve the insect-killing efficacy of their nematode host.

Malnutrition during pregnancy has lasting effects on maternal and offspring health. Its adverse impacts are modified by the maternal microbiome and attenuated by gestational treatment with select microbial metabolites.

High atmospheric concentrations of isoprene have been observed in the Southern Ocean. The authors investigate their potential marine sources and show how these emissions impact the modelling of atmospheric processes and composition in remote environments.

A genome-wide study by the Long COVID Host Genetics Initiative identifies an association between the FOXP4 locus and long COVID, implicating altered lung function in its pathophysiology.

An analysis of global deforestation linked to consumption of products in the supply chains of large economies finds greater losses for vertebrate species’ ranges outside these countries than in them.

Most of the iron-binding ligands are from freshly biologically produced organic matter which likely controls iron biogeochemistry across the Southern Ocean. Our findings have consequences for iron cycling, productivity, and ocean-climate feedbacks.

It is thought that fungi protect themselves from predators by the production of toxic compounds. Here, Xu et al. show that a wide range of animal predators avoid feeding on Fusarium fungi, and this depends on fungal production of a bis-naphthopyrone pigment that is not toxic to the predators.

Georgiou et al. found that the sex of the person performing experiments affects mouse behavior, including responses to stress and ketamine. This effect was mediated by corticotropin-releasing factor neurons in the entorhinal cortex that project to CA1.

Obesity and aging increase Alzheimer’s disease (AD) risk. Here, using an AD mouse model and high-fat diet, we suggest that immune exhaustion links the two risk factors, and identify a metabolite that can hasten immune dysfunction and memory deficit.

Pyramidal cells are classically thought to comprise the excitatory output of the subiculum. Here, the authors show the existence of “ovoid cells”, excitatory subiculum neurons with specialized gene expression, morphology, projections, and function.

Ventral striatal dopamine D3 and D1 receptors regulate motivation and reinforcement, respectively, through dissociable physiological actions.

Designing molecules in drug design is challenging as it requires optimizing multiple, potentially competing qualities. Wu and colleagues present a prompt-based molecule optimization method that can be trained from single-property data.

A study in mice shows that learning induces c-Fos expression in a subset of astrocytes in the hippocampus, and that ensembles of these learning-associated astrocytes are involved in the recall of memories.

Trajectory-coding neurons in the hippocampus convey important information for performing memory tasks. Here, Kinsky et al. track long-term neural activity in the hippocampus to find that trajectory-coding emerges rapidly and remains stable across long time-scales.

The synthesis of alkenes from carboxylic acids, alcohols and alkanes is a formidable challenge owing to their inherent differences in reactivity. Now the one-pot conversion of these building blocks into alkenes is reported through an integrated photochemical strategy using a phenyl vinyl ketone as the olefination reagent.

How and where somatosensory information is encoded in the cortex is unclear and important for developing new pain therapies. Here the authors show a crucial role for the secondary somatosensory cortex (S2) in accurate perception of sensory stimuli.

Jasmonic acid (JA) is involved in defence against herbivores. Once the plant is attacked, the memory of aggression can linger for weeks, including in newly formed leaves. The authors investigate what the induced changes in the transcriptome and methylome are, and uncouple short- and long-term effects of JA.

Smartphone-controlled soft optofluidic probes with replaceable plug-like drug cartridges enable chronic in vivo pharmacology and optogenetics for the selective wireless manipulation of brain circuits in rodents.

Empirical analysis of climate change debates in the US Congress shows that policymakers are most likely to seek out experts confirming their existing views. That information then gets disseminated among like-minded individuals in ‘echo chambers’.

Geometry is crucial in spatial reorientation, but the underlying neural mechanisms of spatial reorientation are unclear. Here, the authors show that in a two-context reorientation task, distinct CA1 cells code heading retrieval and context recognition during reorientation.

Schneeberger et al. show that glutamatergic neurons within the dorsal raphe nucleus of the brainstem are enriched with the orexin 1 receptor Hcrtr1, which can be pharmacologically targeted to treat obesity in mice.

FreemoVR is a virtual reality system for freely moving animals. The versatile platform is demonstrated in various experiments with Drosophila, zebrafish, and mice.

She-male garter snakes exploit the amorous attentions of other males to warm up.

A murine muskelin knockout induces increased exploratory drive and alters cognition and functional connectivity. These effects correlate with actin-dependent changes in dendritic branching, spine structure, and AMPAR-mediated synaptic transmission.