Excited to see our lab present at #FENS2026 this week! 🧠 Come by our posters to see how we use fUSi to study neuromodulation, arousal, vision restoration, and learning. Looking forward to many great discussions!
Emilie Macé
@mace-lab.bsky.social
Neuroscience & functional ultrasound imaging. Vision and brain states. Professor at University Medical Center Göttingen. https://brainwidenetworks.uni-goettingen.de/ Co-Spokesperson, EKFZ Center for Optogenetic Therapies. https://ekfz.uni-goettingen.de/en/
Volumetric functional ultrasound imaging in macaques https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.04.27.721041v1
How does blood flow relate to brain activity? We discovered that it reflects two neural populations affected oppositely by arousal. Together, they explain neurovascular coupling in all brain regions and brain states! Out today in Nature: rdcu.be/fdC2A @uclbrainscience.bsky.social
How do the basal ganglia turn what you see into what you do? New preprint w/ @kenneth-harris.bsky.social, @flickerfusion.bsky.social & @carandinilab.net: we recorded across striatum, GPe & SNr in a Go/NoGo task. Striatum encodes which stimulus, GPe & SNr encode action. 🧵 biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
1/8. New preprint! ✨ How spontaneous is spontaneous behavior? 🧠🐭 We found that whole-brain fUSi signals predicted spontaneous behavioral transitions seconds in advance. Inhibiting one node of this transition-prone state, the medial septum, facilitated switching! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Wait… localized norepinephrine transients in the awake visual cortex?! Who would have guessed this neuromodulatory signal is that spatially precise, right where visual processing is happening. Brain state control just got a lot more local. @ruedigersarah.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...
1/8 New preprint alert! How are signals from the heart encoded in the brain? What could be the functional implications of cardioception? We found that neurons in the posterior insular cortex are precisely tuned to heartbeats, and that this cardio-insular coupling supports emotion coding in mice.
biorxiv.org
1/8. New preprint! Using fUSi in head-fixed mice🐭, we found that arousal events trigger a brain-wide wave of activity 🌊🧠. Surprisingly, this pattern was preserved during opto manipulations of the locus coeruleus, pointing to a minor role for noradrenergic tone. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
1/7 🧠 My journey into development begins with this work and question: how does the brain's spatial navigation system develop? We found that the neural networks for spatial navigation (tori and rings) are preconfigured and only later anchor gradually to the world with experience! 🧵
Is spatial navigation innate 🧠? Using #NeuroPixels we show that the #torus 🍩 underlying the #GridCell map exists already on day 10 in rats — before pups open eyes and ears and before they start upright walking. 🧵1:4 👇 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
DNN models of the brain are getting bigger. Are we replacing one complicated system in vivo with another in silico? In new work, we seek the *smallest* DNN models of visual cortex, balancing prediction with parsimony. It turns out these compact models are surprisingly small! rdcu.be/e5H8G
Compact deep neural network models of the visual cortex
Nature - Parsimonious deep neural network models can be used for prediction of visual neuron responses.
rdcu.be
(1/n) We are excited to share our new paper in Nature Communications, by Hagar Lavian (@hlavian.bsky.social) and team, revealing how the zebrafish brain integrates visual navigation signals! www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Visual motion and landmark position align with heading direction in the zebrafish interpeduncular nucleus - Nature Communications
How are various visual signals integrated in the vertebrate brain for navigation? Here authors show that different spatial signals are topographically organized and align to one another in the zebrafi...
nature.com
How does the brain balance learning new things without overwriting what it already knows? Our new paper tackles this long-standing stability–plasticity dilemma during active navigation. With Tony Drinnenberg from the Deisseroth Lab (@deisseroth.bsky.social) doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Environmental Novelty Modulates Rapid Cortical Plasticity During Navigation
In novel environments, animals quickly learn to navigate, and position-correlated spatial representations rapidly emerge in both the retrosplenial cortex (RSC) and primary visual cortex (V1). However,...
doi.org
Gene editing of single, targeted neurons in vivo is now feasible. We are proud to present our preprint for highly efficient single-cell electroporation using RNA. With @alex-fratzl.bsky.social, @munzlab.bsky.social, Botond Roska @iobswiss.bsky.social #neuroskyence www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
In vivo single-cell gene editing using RNA electroporation reveals sequential adaptation of cortical neurons to excitatory-inhibitory imbalance
The balance between excitatory and inhibitory neurotransmission is fundamental for normal brain function, yet the adaptation of individual neurons to disrupted excitatory-inhibitory balance is not wel...
biorxiv.org
Thrilled to share that our work is now published in Science! ✨ We found a preference for visual objects in the mouse spatial navigation system where they dynamically refine head-direction coding. In short, objects boost our inner compass! 🧭 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... 🧵1/