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2 Janelia Publications

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    Reiser LabFlyLightFly Functional ConnectomeFly Facility
    12/15/22 | Eye structure shapes neuron function in Drosophila motion vision
    Arthur Zhao , Eyal Gruntman , Aljoscha Nern , Nirmala A. Iyer , Edward M. Rogers , Sanna Koskela , Igor Siwanowicz , Marisa Dreher , Miriam A. Flynn , Connor W. Laughland , Henrique D.F. Ludwig , Alex G. Thomson , Cullen P. Moran , Bruck Gezahegn , Davi D. Bock , Michael B. Reiser
    bioRxiv. 2022 Dec 15:. doi: 10.1101/2022.12.14.520178

    Many animals rely on vision to navigate through their environment. The pattern of changes in the visual scene induced by self-motion is the optic flow1, which is first estimated in local patches by directionally selective (DS) neurons24. But how should the arrays of DS neurons, each responsive to motion in a preferred direction at a specific retinal position, be organized to support robust decoding of optic flow by downstream circuits? Understanding this global organization is challenging because it requires mapping fine, local features of neurons across the animal’s field of view3. In Drosophila, the asymmetric dendrites of the T4 and T5 DS neurons establish their preferred direction, making it possible to predict DS responses from anatomy4,5. Here we report that the preferred directions of fly DS neurons vary at different retinal positions and show that this spatial variation is established by the anatomy of the compound eye. To estimate the preferred directions across the visual field, we reconstructed hundreds of T4 neurons in a full brain EM volume6 and discovered unexpectedly stereotypical dendritic arborizations that are independent of location. We then used whole-head μCT scans to map the viewing directions of all compound eye facets and found a non-uniform sampling of visual space that explains the spatial variation in preferred directions. Our findings show that the organization of preferred directions in the fly is largely determined by the compound eye, exposing an intimate and unexpected connection between the peripheral structure of the eye, functional properties of neurons deep in the brain, and the control of body movements.

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    12/15/22 | Neural coding of distinct motor patterns during Drosophila courtship song
    Hiroshi M. Shiozaki , Kaiyu Wang , Joshua L. Lillvis , Min Xu , Barry J. Dickson , David L. Stern
    bioRxiv. 2022 Dec 15:. doi: 10.1101/2022.12.14.520499

    Animals flexibly switch between different actions by changing neural activity patterns for motor control. Courting Drosophila melanogaster males produce two different acoustic signals, pulse and sine song, each of which can be promoted by artificial activation of distinct neurons. However, how the activity of these neurons implements flexible song production is unknown. Here, we developed an assay to record neuronal calcium signals in the ventral nerve cord, which contains the song motor circuit, in singing flies. We found that sine-promoting neurons, but not pulse-promoting neurons, show strong activation during sine song. In contrast, both pulse- and sine-promoting neurons are active during pulse song. Furthermore, population calcium imaging in the song circuit suggests that sine song involves activation of a subset of neurons that are also active during pulse song. Thus, differential activation of overlapping, rather than distinct, neural populations underlies flexible motor actions during acoustic communication in D. melanogaster.

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