Diao, T. | bioRxiv Science

bioRxiv2025

A heart releasing neuropeptide that synchronizes brain-heart regulation during courtship behavior

Distinct internal states drive varied animal behaviors, yet the mechanisms by which non-neuronal factors encode these states remain largely unknown. Here, we show that cardiac activity regulates internal mating states through a conserved brain-heart axis in male flies and mice. In Drosophila, a ppk23-P1 pathway triggers heart rate acceleration upon female perception via crustacean cardioactive peptide, while the heart secretes ion transport peptide that feeds back onto P1 neurons to enhance courtship. Ejaculation rapidly decreases heart rate via Corazonin, mitigating prolonged tachycardia. In mice, a conserved Substance P-TacR1 pathway modulates courtship. Finally, we developed a computational framework to decode internal mating states from cardiac physiology, revealing distinct cardiac signatures. Our findings unveil a novel role for heart-derived neuropeptides in internal state regulation, elucidate a positive feedback loop between the heart and brain, and demonstrate the evolutionary conservation of the brain-heart axis in orchestrating dynamic behavioral and physiological states.

neuroscience↗

bioRxiv2023

Leading and Following: Noise Differently Affects Semantic and Acoustic Processing during Naturalistic Speech Comprehension

Despite the distortion of speech signals caused by unavoidable noise in daily life, our ability to comprehend speech in noisy environments is relatively stable. However, the neural mechanisms underlying reliable speech-in-noise comprehension remain to be elucidated. The present study investigated the neural tracking of acoustic and semantic speech information during noisy naturalistic speech comprehension. Participants listened to narrative audio recordings mixed with spectrally matched stationary noise at three signal-to-ratio (SNR) levels (no noise, 3 dB, -3 dB), and 60-channel electroencephalography (EEG) signals were recorded. A temporal response function (TRF) method was employed to derive event-related-like responses to the continuous speech stream at both the acoustic and the semantic levels. Whereas the amplitude envelope of the naturalistic speech was taken as the acoustic feature, word entropy and word surprisal were extracted via the natural language processing method as two semantic features. Theta-band frontocentral TRF responses to the acoustic feature were observed at around 400 ms following speech fluctuation onset over all three SNR levels, and the response latencies were more delayed with increasing noise. Delta-band frontal TRF responses to the semantic feature of word entropy were observed at around 200 to 600 ms leading to speech fluctuation onset over all three SNR levels. The response latencies became more leading with increasing noise and were correlated with comprehension performance and perceived speech intelligibility. While the following responses to speech acoustics were consistent with previous studies, our study revealed the robustness of leading responses to speech semantics, which suggests a possible predictive mechanism at the semantic level for maintaining reliable speech comprehension in noisy environments. HighlightsO_LILeading responses were observed in the semantic-level neural tracking, with more leading latencies as noise increased. C_LIO_LIFollowing responses were observed in the acoustic-level neural tracking, with more delayed latencies as noise increased. C_LIO_LISemantic-level neural tracking is correlated with comprehension performance and perceived intelligibility. C_LIO_LIDistinct frequency bands were involved in speech semantic and acoustic processing. C_LI

neuroscience↗