Columbia University in the City of New York

May 15, 20203:45 pm
Seminar

Zuckerman Institute Postdoctoral Seminar: May 15

Featuring HaoSheng Sun, PhD (Hobert lab) and Herbert Wu, PhD (Shadlen and Axel labs)

May 15th, 3:45 pm – 5:00 pm at Online

**This seminar will take place virtually via Zoom.**

 

This month's speakers:

HaoSheng Sun, PhD (Hobert lab): "Heterochronic regulation of developmental plasticity in post-embryonic neuronal transitions"

During the intricately-timed sequence of nervous system maturation, significant disruptions to the dynamic regulatory process through genetic and environmental risks can result in neurodevelopmental disorders. The period from early post-natal life to adulthood is critical for proper development of the mature brain, as extensive structural and behavioral plasticity are observed. However, much less is known about the molecular regulatory mechanisms underlying neuronal maturation during post-natal development. Taking advantage of the compact nervous system of Caenorhabditis elegans, we are profiling the nervous system transcriptomes throughout early post-natal life to adulthood as an entry point to identify upstream transcriptional regulators. In addition, we are examining the role of the heterochronic pathway as candidate regulators in neuronal maturation. Together, we provide a molecular map of post-embryonic neuronal development that will serve as an entry point to study the transcriptional regulatory mechanisms of neuronal maturation.

Herbert Wu, PhD (Shadlen and Axel labs): "Context-dependent decision making in a premotor circuit"

Cognitive capacities afford contingent associations between sensory information and behavioral responses. We address this problem by designing an olfactory delayed match to sample task in which the association between a test odor and rewarded action is instructed by the identity of a prior odor. Analysis of neural activity revealed that piriform and orbitofrontal cortices contained sufficient information to solve the task. However, inactivation of a downstream premotor area, anterolateral motor cortex (ALM), prior to delivery of the test odor, impaired behavioral performance. These observations suggest that a context-dependent association between the test odor and motor response is established within the premotor area. A novel population of pyramidal neurons in ALM layer 2 may mediate this process.

 

This seminar is part of the Zuckerman Institute Postdoctoral Seminar series. For questions about this or future seminars, please contact [email protected].

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