Imagine yourself in a car race waiting for the traffic light to go green. Impulsivity could push you to accelerate when the light is still red. In contrast, temporally guided anticipation could lead you to accelerate at the time the light goes green. Whether these two types of early responses rely on the same or different neural processes is an open question. This question was investigated using an oculomotor task where the delay between a warning and an imperative visual stimuli was predictable. The spatial uncertainty of the ‘go’ signal was also varied. On average, 10% of experimental trials were associated with a response before the ‘go’ signal (‘early saccade’). After the offset of the warning stimulus, the latency distribution of early saccades was bimodal, with a first mode peaking after 200 ms (1st mode saccades) and a second one starting to build-up after 375 ms (2nd mode saccades). With increasing delay duration: the number of 1st mode responses decreased whereas the number of 2nd mode responses r...

Psychedelic drugs have garnered increasing attention for their therapeutic potential in treating a variety of psychiatric diseases, such as depression, anxiety, and substance use disorder. The claustrum (CLA), a brain area with remarkable interconnectivity to frontal cortices, has recently been shown to have a dense population of serotonin 2 receptors (5-HT2Rs) that are activated by psychedelics. Because psychedelic therapy can require as little as one treatment session, it has been speculated that psychedelics achieve their long-term remedial effects by inducing neuroplasticity in brain areas responsible for psychiatric disease states, such as the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). However, the effects of psychedelics on synaptic plasticity in serotonin receptor-rich brain areas remain entirely unexplored. We applied pre-synaptic stimuli paired with post-synaptic action potentials to a subpopulation of CLA neurons projecting to ACC in male rats to find that the psychedelic drug, DOI, reverses the polarity o...

Attachment theory offers an important clinical framework for understanding and treating negative effects of early life adversity. Attachment styles emerge during critical periods of development in response to caregivers’ ability to consistently meet their offspring’s needs. Attachment styles are classified as secure or insecure (anxious, avoidant, or disorganized), with rates of insecure attachment rising in high-risk populations and correlating with a plethora of negative health outcomes throughout life. Despite its importance, little is known about the neural basis of attachment. Work in rats has demonstrated that limited bedding and nesting (LB) impairs maternal care and produces abnormal maternal attachment linked to increased pup corticosterone. However, the effects of LB on attachment-like behavior have not been investigated in mice where additional genetic and molecular tools are available. Furthermore, no group has utilized home-cage monitoring to link abnormal maternal care with deficits in attach...

Hippocampal pyramidal cells are involved in spatial coding and memory formation. Recent evidence shows that they can be classified according to the origin of their axon, which either emerges from the soma (nonAcD for ‘non-axon-carrying dendrite’) or from a proximal basal dendrite (AcD). We have shown that AcD neurons account for ∼50% of CA1 pyramidal neurons and that they integrate excitatory inputs differently. They are less susceptible to perisomatic inhibition and are more strongly recruited during memory-related network oscillations with strong inhibitory activity. Here, we tested whether AcD and nonAcD neurons are differentially engaged during distinct stages of spatial learning. We trained mice of either sex on a spatial memory task (m-maze) and quantified cFos expression in CA1 pyramidal neurons at different training stages. AcD and nonAcD cells were distinguished by staining the axon initial segment. Across learning stages, dorsal and medio-ventral hippocampus showed distinct activation patterns. I...

Exposure to early life stress (ELS) can exert long-lasting impacts on emotional regulation. The corticolimbic system including the basolateral amygdala (BLA), ventral hippocampus (vHIP), and the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) plays a key role in fear learning. Using the limited bedding paradigm (LB), we examined the functional consequences of ELS on excitatory and inhibitory tone in the prelimbic (PL) mPFC after fear conditioning in rats. In adults, LB exposure enhanced in vivo glutamate release in the PL mPFC during fear conditioning in male, but not female offspring. In contrast, the glutamate response to fear conditioning was diminished in LB-exposed pre-adolescent males, but not females. We investigated whether reduced glutamatergic inputs and/or elevated inhibitory tone might contribute to the diminished glutamate response in the mPFC following LB in pre-adolescent male rats. Indeed, we found that LB exposure specifically increased the activation of PV, but not SST interneurons in layer V, but not la...

Effective science communication refers to the ability to discuss science in terms that your audience will understand. Scientists can communicate inwardly to colleagues, or outwardly with important stakeholders such as the public, government, industry, educators, or even scientists outside of one’s field. One high-profile arena in which effective communication is needed is science policy. Scientists must explain the importance of science funding to lawmakers who write the budgets for federal science spending each year. Without the ability to discuss complex science in layman’s terms, decision makers will fail to understand why scientists’ work is important.

Peter Dallos is the John Evans Professor of Neuroscience Emeritus in the department of neurobiology at Northwestern University and was the founding chair of the department of neurobiology at Northwestern University.

It is widely argued that the processes of science and art are very different. Most of the debaters are neither scientists nor artists, or only one of the two professions. I am both, however, and I suggest remarkable similarities between the artistic and scientific methods.

Peter Dallos is the John Evans Professor of Neuroscience Emeritus in the department of neurobiology at Northwestern University and was the founding chair of the department of neurobiology at Northwestern University.

Virtual interview weekends were a necessity brought on by COVID-19. Now, with virtual work persisting across multiple industries, remote interviews may stick around post-pandemic. Use these 10 tips to prepare for your virtual interview weekend.