Researchers from the McKelvey School of Engineering and the Kepecs Lab have a new paper in Nature Neuroscience describing their development of a panoramically reconfigurable illuminative (PRIME) that offers a powerful platform for optical control of neural circuits across the brain.
A new paper in eLife from the Cavalli Lab reveals that inhibiting ETBR function enhances axon regeneration and rescues the age-dependent decrease in axonal regenerative capacity, providing a potential avenue for future therapies.
Lawrence Snyder, MD, PhD, is part of a new study in Nature Communications that demonstrates that artificial neurons can function as trans-functional devices (transneurons) that reconfigure their behavior to attain instantaneous computational needs, each capable of emulating several biological neurons.
Gaia Tavoni, PhD, and Kaining Zhang, PhD, have published a new paper that offers insights into the memory capacity of brain-inspired networks.
In a study published June 12 in The Journal of Neuroscience, WashU researchers show how they used optogenetics in the larval zebrafish to map the connectivity and activity of V2b neurons, a major inhibitory spinal population, to receive the results.
Tom Franken, MD, PhD, has recent papers published in iScience and Neuron that add new knowledge to how the brain processes complex visual input.
Thomas Papouin, PhD, assistant professor of neuroscience, is the senior author of a groundbreaking study published May 15 in Science.
In a study published April 11 in Science, Adam Kepecs, PhD, and other WashU Medicine researchers report they discovered a previously unrecognized pathway in the brain that senses inflammation and actively suppresses dopamine — a key driver of motivation — resulting in apathy and loss of drive.
![Figure 2. Diagram of a Kv3 potassium channel subunit and the location of the V473A variant. (A) Kv3 subunit with 6 transmembrane domains. P indicates the pore domain governing the ion selectivity of the channel. The colored filled circles in S6 represent selected dominant gain-of-function variants in Kv3.1 and Kv3.2. The KV3.2 V473A variant is located near the cytoplasmic opening of the channel pore (red). Kv3.1 variants: 1) V425M, 3) M430I, 4) V432M, 5) V434L (Ambrosino et al., 2023); KV3.2 variants: 2) I465V, 6) V471L (Li et al., 2022; Schwarz et al., 2022), 7) V473A (Schwarz et al., 2022) (which is the topic of this study). (B) Position of WT V473 and V473A variant on S6 in the Kv3.2 channel structure. The WT V473 (red) is located near the cytoplasmic mouth of the channel and may be important in stabilizing the closed structure (left image). The variant V473A is shown in the right image (red). Structures of human Kv3.2 were based on the cryo-EM structure of the highly similar paralog, Kv3.1, where the S6 amino acid sequence is identical for Kv3.1 and Kv3.2. The residue position V436 in the Kv3.1 sequence is equivalent to residue V473 in Kv3.2 [P48547 KCNC1 compared to Q96PR1 KCNC2 - UniProt]. The images of human Kv3.1 structure were prepared in UCSF Chimera (Pettersen et al., 2004). The V436A (V473A) variation in the Kv3.1 (Kv3.2) structure was generated from the WT Kv3.1 cryo-EM structure (PDB: 7PHH) by replacing V436 with Alanine using the Swapaa function in UCSF Chimera (right image).](https://neuroscience.wustl.edu/app/uploads/2025/02/fphar-15-1528541-g002-286x300.jpg)
In Frontiers in Pharmacology, Lawrence Salkoff, PhD, and colleagues report how norfluoxetine, a long-lasting metabolite of fluoxetine that may accumulate in the brain at greater concentrations than fluoxetine itself in patients treated with fluoxetine, is most likely the agent bringing relief to the patients.
In Nature, Cheng Huang, PhD, and colleagues show that in the Drosophila brain, interconnected short- and long-term memory units of the mushroom body jointly regulate memory through dopamine signals that encode innate and learnt sensory valences.