The structure and function of the neuron

It is a collection of papers about the structure and function.

Hacking brain development to test models of sensory coding

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.01.25.525425v1
E. Josephine Clowney

By altering the number of expansion layer neurons (Kenyon cells) and their dendritic complexity,
we find that input number, but not cell number, tunes odor selectivity.

comment:

It is interesting! If it is true, the neuron will work as a unit. They receive input from different numbers of synapses, and it will be activated, only if the number reaches a threshold.

It will be a standard graph.

On the relationship between maps and domains in inferotemporal cortex

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41583-021-00490-4
Margaret S. Livingstone

ventral-stream modules do not represent clusters of circuits that each evolved to process some specific object category particularly important for survival, but instead reflect the effects of experience on a domain-general architecture that evolved to be able to adapt, within a lifetime, to its particular environment.

comment:

The domain of face recognition has a significant overlap with the domain of curve.

It indicates that face recognition might be the result of curve recognition.

I want to emphasize that the high-level function of the human brain is combined with or originated from some basic functions.

How fly neurons compute the direction of visual motion

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00359-019-01375-9
Alexander Borst
(youtube.com/watch?v=p8n1XODZ1Nc)

comment:

The function of computing the direction is associated with the neuron's structure.

Unilateral tree structure will lead to the specialization for moving direction of the edge.

Molecular topography of an entire nervous system

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867421007583 David M. Miller III C. elegans

Each neuron type expresses a distinct code of neuropeptide genes and receptors Expression profiles enable discovery of cell-type-specific cis-regulatory sequences Cell adhesion molecules correlate with neuron-specific connectivity

Multisensory learning binds neurons into a cross-modal memory engram

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06013-8 Scott Waddell

another paper by their lab: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0092867418310377 Integration of Parallel Opposing Memories Underlies Memory Extinction

comment:

They found a type of neuron that can combine the information from two kinds of sensories. This function is supported by their special structure(see the figure for detail). More importantly, the place for connection(information integration) is DAN, a type of dopamine neuron, which means it might be the basis of learning and memory.

It might be a toy model for associate learning( the most important function of the human brain).