Dena Goldblatt
@denagoldblatt.bsky.social
Postdoc at NINDS. Interests in spinal circuit assembly & function, neuro-evo-devo. 🐟—>🐭. Prev. Brandeis, NYU Neuro, DSPAN fellow
Bsky hivemind: what are we liking for Xenium cell type classifiers these days? Have tried RCTD, tangram, and label transfer. 50% of the dataset is easy to classify, but wildly different results across classifiers for the other 50%. +1 if anyone’s specifically fought with spinal cord data. Thx!
Excited to share a new preprint from the lab, by @andrewmatheson.bsky.social and team, where we dive into the superpower of newts: plasticity! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... Like many good projects, this started with a serendipitous observation... 🧵1/5
Neuronal circuits are assembled using a repertoire of different chemical and electrical synapses, with the latter connecting the cytoplasm between two neurons. Anne Martin asks how this complex process develops, finding proteins that bridge both synapse types. #2026SDB Preprint⤵️
Electrical synapse molecular diversity revealed by proximity-based proteomic discovery
Neuronal circuits are composed of synapses that are either chemical, where signals are transmitted via neurotransmitter release and reception, or electrical, where signals pass directly through intern...
biorxiv.org
🐐 Poissons, ecrevisses et crabes, de diverses couleurs et figures extraordinaires, . A Amsterdam, Chez Reinier & Josué Ottens, 1754.. [Source]
Want to hear something freaky? If a deer gets a cut on its antlers while it's still in velvet, the next year when the deer grows a completely NEW rack, it will often grow an extra branch in the exact spot of the cut. Let's talk about TROPHIC MEMORY, the weird way cells (may) remember each other.
Majestic Deer with Huge Velvet Antlers
Alt: Majestic Deer with Huge Velvet Antlers. To be clear, this is probably a genetic event or even a breeding decision, but it illustrates the strange ways that antlers can grow. This poor buck, I'm assuming probably a white tailed deer, looks a bit overwhelmed to have a monstrous rack.
static.klipy.com
I'm mostly doing "Slow Reads" over on substack (it's always free), so you might get through a cup of coffee reading this one. Make sure you read to the end. profmcinerney.substack.com/p/good-enough
Good enough
What we have learned from absurd evolution
profmcinerney.substack.com
📣 Exciting news: my lab is moving to the Krembil Institute at the University of Toronto’s University Health Network in Fall 2026. We’ll be recruiting for all roles, so reach out if you’re interesting in joining us to study spinal circuits for sensorimotor control www.levine-lab.org
Home | Levine Lab
levine-lab.org
In vivo imaging of zebrafish spinal cord neural circuit development, captured with adaptive optical lattice light-sheet microscopy. Credit to Eric Betzig @hhmijanelia.bsky.social. #ZebrafishZunday 🧪
Our new work goes from genes to behavior to understand the molecular underpinnings of the most common childhood disorder of vision: strabismus. Led by UCSF-bound Emily Gershowitz & Kyla Hamling, plus rockstars @denagoldblatt.bsky.social & @paigel.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
🧵 New preprint led by @bingbrunton.bsky.social, @elliottabe.bsky.social, @lawrencehu.bsky.social We gave a worm brain control of a fly body and it walked What did we learn? Nothing, other than deep reinforcement learning is effective We call it the digital sphinx www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Mammals have hundreds of joints and muscles. Controlling them individually would be nearly impossible. How does the nervous system organize such complexity into coherent actions? Our new study explores this question through a natural behavior: jumping.
Check out the newest work from our, from Fabricio Nicola @fabricionicola.bsky.social on mouse jumping and spinal cell types. Excellent collab with @vulcnethologist.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
A spinal substrate for modular control of natural behavior
Natural behavior unfolds as coordinated sequences of body movements. This organization suggests that behavior may be built from discrete motor patterns, yet how such arrangements are implemented by neural circuits remains unknown. Here, we combined kinematic analysis, muscle recordings, genetically identified cell types, and closed-loop optogenetic perturbations to examine the organizational logic of natural gap-crossing jumps in mice. Jumping was characterized by a series of precisely defined phases and their associated modular motor patterns. The core phases, propulsion and flight, exhibited distinct signatures of neural control, including unique bursts of coordinated hindlimb muscle activity, differential tuning strategies for jump distance, and active requirements for spinal neural drive. Mapping activity across lumbar interneuron populations and functionally screening candidate cell types for their ability to drive coordinated movement revealed that a population of dorsal excitatory dILB6 neurons can autonomously evoke coordinated multi-joint hindlimb flexion characteristic of the jumping flight phase, across behavioral contexts. These findings provide a specific cellular substrate for the long-standing concept of spinal modular motor control: a flexible, preconfigured motor template that the mammalian CNS can recruit and modulate to meet the demands of natural behavior. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. Intramural Research Program of the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
biorxiv.org
Fabricio Nicola@fabricionicola.bsky.social · 7mo agoMammals have hundreds of joints and muscles. Controlling them individually would be nearly impossible. How does the nervous system organize such complexity into coherent actions? Our new study explores this question through a natural behavior: jumping.
This one is extra special: my rockstar former UG (now MD-PhD!) Stephanie's first 1st author paper, and my first as senior author, is now out in Development!
Birthdate aligns vestibular sensory neurons with central and motor partners across a sensorimotor reflex circuit for gaze stabilization
Highlighted Article: Circuit nodes often develop along common axes. We find that a ‘first-come, first-served’ temporal rule underscores the organization of a canonical sensorimotor circuit for gaze st...
journals.biologists.com
1/6: New publication from the lab: “Plastic landmark anchoring in zebrafish compass neurons” by Ryosuke Tanaka (@ryosuketanaka.bsky.social) and Ruben is available here: rdcu.be/eX1L4
Plastic landmark anchoring in zebrafish compass neurons
Nature - Using two-photon microscopy with a panoramic virtual reality setup, how head direction cells in larval zebrafish integrate visual landmarks and optic flow to track orientation is revealed.
rdcu.be
Nature research paper: Rewiring an olfactory circuit by altering cell-surface combinatorial code go.nature.com/3MbCoZT
Rewiring an olfactory circuit by altering cell-surface combinatorial code - Nature
In Drosophila, changing the expression of a small set of cell-surface proteins in just one type of olfactory neuron rewires its connections almost entirely to a new postsynaptic partner neuron type, altering the fly’s odour response and courtship behaviour.
go.nature.com
Excited to share this work where we found how fish swim differently to keep balance in the dark / explore more in the light. Spoiler: ever wonder what they do during “little pauses” between swims? They are counting!
David Schoppik@schoppik.com · 11mo agoLike most animals, fish move less at night. Underwater, stable posture requires movement. Find out how fish don't fall down at night in: Lighting and circadian cues shape locomotor strategies for balance and navigation in larval zebrafish from @yunluzhu.bsky.social doi.org/10.1101/2025...
I've updated my Bioinformatics Bootcamp: Zebrafish Special Edition blog post on @the-node.bsky.social! Please do share with trainees or anyone new to the community. I hope it adds some breadth to the many resources available to #zebrafish researchers. 🔗 thenode.biologists.com/bioinformati...
Bioinformatics Bootcamp - Zebrafish Special Edition - the Node
A deep-dive into the many cool (and free) resources available to zebrafish researchers! Disclaimer: This is not a comprehensive list but a list of useful
thenode.biologists.com
Latest from the lab. Beautiful work from Joanna Lau and a fantastic collaboration with James Fitzgerald. www.cell.com/current-biol...
Supraspinal commands have a modular organization that is behavioral context specific
Lau et al. use calcium imaging and statistical modeling to comprehensively survey reticulospinal activity during diverse locomotor behaviors. They find that a small set of functional modules act combi...
cell.com
I got this in my head and I couldn't focus on work until it existed. Microscopy image file alignment chart, based on how I feel if you give me an image to analyze:
Excited to share that our manuscript "In situ lightfield imaging of octopus locomotion reveals simplified control" has been published in @nature.com. www.nature.com/articles/s41... If you love 🧪🌎🦑🌊, keep reading this thread! 1/n
In case you've ever wondered, I talked with @amjeve.bsky.social about science, myself, and the future of #DevBio as part of the Pathway to Independence Fellowship @biologists.bsky.social 🧪 journals.biologists.com/dev/article/...
Pathway to Independence – an interview with Joaquín Navajas Acedo
Joaquín Navajas Acedo is a Postdoc in the lab of Dr Alexander Schier in Biozentrum at the University of Basel, Switzerland. He is interested in how the nervous system evolves and develops at the singl...
journals.biologists.com
New preprint! tl;dr — We ran around late at night to record wild rats in NYC and figured out how to quantify their behavior and environment. 🧵 w/ Dima Batenkov, @zamakany.bsky.social, Emily Mackevicius www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Computational Urban Ecology of New York City Rats
Urban rats are highly adaptable, thriving in the dynamic and often inhospitable conditions of modern cities. Despite substantial mitigation efforts, they remain an enduring presence in urban environme...
biorxiv.org
Incredible — close enough to see, too far away to hear… @capitalweather.bsky.social from Bethesda
Meanwhile, in RI: “Well you drive past the big blue bug and the old Apex building and then turn left at the Dunkin…”
Paulrus of West Bumblefrick@paulrusof.bsky.social · last yr.I am officially one of The Ancients, Keeper of Knowledge of the Before Time
Are all muppets the same species just with wildly different phenotypes like dogs or are there a lot of different species of muppet
![5-panel comic. (1) [teacher with long hair next to whiteboard] TEACHER: I’m supposed to give you the tools to do good science. (2) [teacher addressing students] But what *are* those tools? Methodology is hard and there are so many ways to get incorrect results. What is the magic ingredient that makes for good science? (3) TEACHER: To figure it out, I ran a regression with all the factors people say are important: [embedded list in sub-panel, cut off at end] Outcome variable: correct scientific results. Predictors: collaboration; skepticism of others’ claims; questioning your own beliefs; trying to falsify hypotheses; checking citations; statistical rigor; blinded analysis; financial disclosure; open data (4) TEACHER: The regression says two ingredients are the most crucial: 1) genuine curiosity about the answer to a question, and 2) ammonium hydroxide. (5) STUDENT: Wait, why did *ammonia* score so high? How did it even get on the list? LONG HAIR: ...And now you’re doing good science!](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:cz73r7iyiqn26upot4jtjdhk/bafkreigzaphhj4mfgfrxddlvdmw47335gnwzqbfqvrnff5x4oovgpf36nq)
