Visuell-motorische Verarbeitung in retino-kollikulären und kortiko-kollikulären Schaltkreisen

• Antragsteller: Professor Dr. Jens Kremkow
• Fachliche Zuordnung: Kognitive, systemische und Verhaltensneurobiologie
• Förderung: Förderung von 2017 bis 2024
• Projektkennung: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Projektnummer 348229062

• Erstellungsjahr: 2025

Zusammenfassung der Projektergebnisse

Retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) encode the visual world in parallel pathways and transmit these signals through their axons along the optic nerve to various regions of the vertebrate brain. This project focuses on studying the principles of how sensory inputs are integrated within the visual system. Specifically, I aimed to investigate the functional organization of afferent connections in both the visual cortex and the superior colliculus, employing a combination of in vivo experiments and computational modeling techniques. During my postdoc I discovered organizing principles underlying sensory maps in primary visual cortex in vivo. The first aim was to elaborate on the hypothesis that sorting thalamic afferents by type (spatial position, eye input, light-dark polarity) in cortex is important for establishing multidimensional maps in visual cortex. To that end we studied a computational model of the developing retino-geniculo-cortical pathway. Investigating the functional organization of afferent connections in vivo requires recording the activity of the afferent neurons and their connected targets simultaneously. Paired recordings with multiple electrodes have classically been employed, however, this approach has a very low yield in recording connected pairs. Therefore, the next aim was to develop a more efficient method to measure the activity of afferent neurons and their postsynaptic targets in vivo using high-density electrodes, with a focus on the retinocollicular and thalamocortical circuits. The superior colliculus is a midbrain structure that plays a crucial role in visually guided behaviors. Neurons in the SC receive inputs from retinal ganglion cells (RGC), but the fine scale organization of RGC axons within the SC and how SC neurons integrate RGC inputs in vivo remained unclear. Furthermore, the SC contains one of the highest densities of inhibitory neurons in the brain but whether excitatory and inhibitory SC neurons differentially integrate retinal activity in vivo was largely unknown. In this project I therefore aimed at studying the functional organization of the retinocollicular circuit on the cell-type specific level using high-density electrodes and optogenetic methods. Finally, the functional organization of the retinocollicular circuit is shaped during the development by retinal waves. However, whether the spatiotemporal properties of retinal waves could be related to the orientation map in SC, and in particular to its concentric organization, was unknown. In this project we therefore studied the development of the retinocollicular circuit using a computational model, incorporating published and new experimental data.

Projektbezogene Publikationen (Auswahl)

• Thalamocortical Circuits and Functional Architecture. Annual Review of Vision Science, 4(1), 263-285.
  Kremkow, Jens & Alonso, Jose-Manuel
  
• Functional specificity of afferent connections in visual thalamus. Neuron, 109(15), 2368-2370.
  Kremkow, Jens & Alonso, Jose Manuel
  
• A theory of cortical map formation in the visual brain. Nature Communications, 13(1).
  Najafian, Sohrab; Koch, Erin; Teh, Kai Lun; Jin, Jianzhong; Rahimi-Nasrabadi, Hamed; Zaidi, Qasim; Kremkow, Jens & Alonso, Jose-Manuel
  
• Absence of the Fragile X messenger ribonucleoprotein alters response patterns to sounds in the auditory midbrain. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 16.
  Sibille, Jérémie; Kremkow, Jens & Koch, Ursula
  
• Coordination between Eye Movement and Whisking in Head-Fixed Mice Navigating a Plus Maze. eneuro, 9(4), ENEURO.0089-22.2022.
  Bergmann, Ronny; Sehara, Keisuke; Dominiak, Sina E.; Kremkow, Jens; Larkum, Matthew E. & Sachdev, Robert N. S.
  
• Efficient mapping of the thalamocortical monosynaptic connectivity in vivo by tangential insertions of high-density electrodes in cortex. openRxiv.
  Sibille, Jérémie; Gehr, Carolin & Kremkow, Jens
  
• High-density electrode recordings reveal strong and specific connections between retinal ganglion cells and midbrain neurons. Nature Communications, 13(1).
  Sibille, Jérémie; Gehr, Carolin; Benichov, Jonathan I.; Balasubramanian, Hymavathy; Teh, Kai Lun; Lupashina, Tatiana; Vallentin, Daniela & Kremkow, Jens
  
• Tangential high-density electrode insertions allow to simultaneously measure neuronal activity across an extended region of the visual field in mouse superior colliculus. Journal of Neuroscience Methods, 376, 109622.
  Sibille, Jérémie; Gehr, Carolin; Teh, Kai Lun & Kremkow, Jens
  
• Retinal input integration in excitatory and inhibitory neurons in the mouse superior colliculus in vivo. eLife, 12.
  Gehr, Carolin; Sibille, Jeremie & Kremkow, Jens
  
• Retinal waves align the concentric orientation map in mouse superior colliculus to the center of vision. Science Advances, 9(19).
  Teh, Kai Lun; Sibille, Jérémie; Gehr, Carolin & Kremkow, Jens
  
• Differential Short-Term Facilitation Of Synaptic Inputs And Spike Transmission At The Retinocollicular Synapse In Vivo. openRxiv.
  Teh, Kai Lun; Dossi, Elena; Rouach, Nathalie; Sibille, Jérémie & Kremkow, Jens
  
• Sequential visual stimuli increase high frequency power in the visual cortex. openRxiv.
  Keil, Julian; Hernandez-Urbina, Victor; Vassiliou, Chrystalleni; Dean, Camin; Schmitz, Dietmar; Kremkow, Jens & Sibille, Jérémie