Hindbrain V2a neurons impose rhythmic activity on motor neurons in an in vitro reticulospinal circuit

Bubnys, A.; Kandel, H.; Kow, L.-M.; Pfaff, D. W.; Tabansky, I.

doi:10.1101/620674

Home/Archive/bioRxiv

bioRxiv · 10.1101/620674

Hindbrain V2a neurons impose rhythmic activity on motor neurons in an in vitro reticulospinal circuit

Bubnys, A.·Kandel, H.·Kow, L.-M.·Pfaff, D. W.·Tabansky, I.

View original source ↗Export metadata ↓

Abstract

The reticulospinal system is an evolutionarily conserved pathway among vertebrates that relays locomotor control signals from the hindbrain to the spinal cord. Recent studies have identified specific hindbrain cell types that participate in this circuit, including Chx10+ neurons of the medullary reticular formation, which project to the spinal cord and are active during periods of locomotion. To create a system in which reticulospinal neurons communicate with spinal motor effectors, we have constructed an in vitro model using two purified excitatory neuronal subtypes: HB9+ spinal motor neurons and Chx10+ hindbrain neurons. Cultured separately, these neurons exhibit cell type-specific patterns of activity; the Chx10+ cultures developed regular, synchronized bursts of activity that recruited neurons across the entire culture, whereas motor neuron activity consisted of an irregular pattern. A combination of the two subtypes produced cultures in which Chx10+ neurons recruited the motor neurons into synchronized network bursts, which were dependent on AMPA receptors. In addition to demonstrating that the activity of in vitro networks can depend on the developmental identity of their constituent neurons, we provide a new model with genetically specified nerve cell types to study the activity of a reticulospinal circuit.\n\nSignificance statementModels of the brain that use cultured neurons are usually comprised of a complex mixture of different kinds of cells, making it hard to determine how each cell type contributes to the overall pattern of activity. We made a simplified culture containing two cell types known to form a reticulospinal circuit in vivo. While in isolated cultures, each cell type had a distinct pattern of activity, in coculture the activity of one cell type came to dominate, indicating that the patterns observed in complex neuronal cultures arise in part from the distinctive properties of the constituent neurons.

Source connections

Published article ↗

Explore related subjects

neuroscience Preprint

Keep this discovery

Explore connections, maps & timelines

BibTeX RIS

Bubnys, A., Kandel, H., Kow, L.-M., Pfaff, D. W., Tabansky, I.. 2019-04-26. Hindbrain V2a neurons impose rhythmic activity on motor neurons in an in vitro reticulospinal circuit. https://doi.org/10.1101/620674

Cite the original work for its findings. Save a collection to share your selection of sources.

KEEP EXPLORING

Related preprints

bioRxiv2026

The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Cell Types in Describing Neuronal Physiological Features

Single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) captures detailed gene expression profiles at scale, while patch-clamp recordings measure intrinsic neuronal electrophysiological properties. Modeling the relations between these two modalities remains a challenge. Here, we compare how well electrophysiological features can be predicted by traditional transcriptomic cell type classification, representations derived from a foundational model (scGPT) pretrained on large-scale scRNA-seq datasets, ion channel-coding genes, and highly variable genes. Using paired transcriptomic and electrophysiological patch-sequencing data from 495 human neurons from neurosurgical tissue, we find that cluster-level cell type representations consistently outperform highly variable gene selection, ion channel gene selection, and context-enriched scGPT embeddings. Notably, performance varies across model architectures and initializations, and the best results are obtained by combining the outputs of separate cell type and scGPT-based models. Together, these findings suggest that traditional discrete cellular classification is highly effective in predicting physiological features. For maximum performance it can be complemented by pretrained transformer models.

neuroscience↗

bioRxiv2026

A nonlinear inhibition pathway underlying cortical responses to tuned holographic optogenetic perturbations

Optogenetics enables causal manipulation of cortical activity. Perturbation responses can be counterintuitive due to network interactions, making theory essential for predicting them. Existing approaches often rely on linear approximations, which fail for many biologically relevant perturbations. Here we develop a nonlinear theory of responses to holographic perturbations in cell-type-specific recurrent networks with structured connectivity. We fit a nonlinear model to mouse V1 data, which shows cotuned-ensemble suppression: perturbing spatially clustered neurons with similar preferred orientations yields markedly stronger short-range suppression than perturbing untuned ensembles. We show that cotuned-ensemble suppression arises from a feature-tuned, nonlinear inhibition pathway implicating somatostatin-positive (SST) interneurons. The theory predicts that cotuned ensembles suppress parvalbumin-positive (PV) neurons but facilitate SST neurons, and links the degree of cotuned-ensemble suppression or facilitation to the variance of the SST response. This framework identifies mechanisms by which nonlinear inhibition sculpts cortical dynamics and establishes a predictive basis for targeted optogenetic interventions.

neuroscience↗

bioRxiv2026

Proteomic signatures of APOE ε4 across human tissues and cell types in Alzheimers disease

The apolipoprotein E {varepsilon}4 (APOE {varepsilon}4) allele is the strongest genetic risk factor for late-onset Alzheimers disease (AD). However, the underlying molecular mechanisms remain unclear. This study included 1691 participants from the Religious Orders Study and Rush Memory and Aging Project (ROSMAP), 1226 participants from the Accelerating Medicines Partnership - Alzheimers Disease (AMP-AD) Diverse Cohorts Study, and 735 participants from the Alzheimers Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI). To characterise APOE {varepsilon}4 molecular effects, we analysed proteomic data from plasma, cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), and induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-derived astrocytes and neurons, as well as transcriptomic and proteomic data from multiple brain regions. The association of APOE {varepsilon}4 with AD neuropathology was also examined. APOE {varepsilon}4 carriers shared a plasma proteomic signature enriched for immune processes, irrespective of AD diagnosis. A machine learning classifier trained on this signature discriminated APOE {varepsilon}4 carriers from non-carriers in an independent cohort using CSF proteomics. APOE {varepsilon}4 carriage was associated with higher Braak stages and Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimers Disease (CERAD) score. However, only limited APOE {varepsilon}4-associated transcriptomic and proteomic changes were observed in bulk brain tissue, with poor cross-layer concordance. Proteomic analyses of iPSC-derived astrocytes and neurons further revealed cell-type-specific APOE {varepsilon}4-associated changes. APOE {varepsilon}4 is associated with a consistent proteomic signature across plasma and CSF. Its molecular effects in the brain differ across cell types, brain regions and molecular layers. These findings support the need for cell-type-resolved multi-omic studies to elucidate how APOE {varepsilon}4 confers AD risk.

neuroscience↗