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Cellular level neuroscience for everyone.
TheCellularScale
97 posts
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- May 18, 2013
- 09:21 AM
- 62 views
Homeostatic platsicity in a thorny situation
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
Synapses, the connections between neurons can strengthen and weaken depending on the specific activity at that synapse. This is called synaptic plasticity, and we've talked about it a lot on this blog (here, here, here and here).the strengthening and weakening of synaptic connections corresponds to the spine growing or shrinking (Matsuzaki 2007)However, there is another kind of plasticity that can occur at synapses. This is called homeostatic plasticity. And instead of the synapse strengthening ........ Read more »
Lee KJ, Queenan BN, Rozeboom AM, Bellmore R, Lim ST, Vicini S, & Pak DT. (2013) Mossy fiber-CA3 synapses mediate homeostatic plasticity in mature hippocampal neurons. Neuron, 77(1), 99-114. PMID: 23312519
- May 12, 2013
- 08:00 PM
- 74 views
The Inadvertent Psychological Experiment
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
Escape from Camp 14 is deeply disturbing, and I highly recommend it. Escape from Camp 14 by Blaine HardenEscape from Camp 14 is a chilling tale of Shin Dong-hyuk's escape from a North Korean prison camp. What is so interesting about Shin Dong-hyuk's story as written by Blaine Harden is that he was born inside this North Korean prison camp. Apparently they allow breeding between prisoners as a reward for 'good behavior.'Escape from Camp 14 reveals the obscene violations of human rights that occur........ Read more »
Lee YM, Shin OJ, & Lim MH. (2012) The psychological problems of north korean adolescent refugees living in South Korea. Psychiatry investigation, 9(3), 217-22. PMID: 22993519
- May 2, 2013
- 12:51 PM
- 91 views
a STORM inside a cell
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
We've been talking about some of the most cutting edge intracellular visualization techniques lately. Array tomography and Serial block-face electron microscopy have been featured. Today we'll talk about STORM imaging. STORM imaging (Xu et al., 2013)STORM stands for Stochastic Optical Reconstruction Microscopy. While Array tomography and Serial block-face EM are both revolutionary in that they can combine very high resolution imaging with relatively large volumes of tissue, STORM is an advanceme........ Read more »
Xu K, Zhong G, & Zhuang X. (2013) Actin, spectrin, and associated proteins form a periodic cytoskeletal structure in axons. Science (New York, N.Y.), 339(6118), 452-6. PMID: 23239625
- April 22, 2013
- 08:20 PM
- 108 views
Connecting Form and Function: Serial Block-face EM
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
The retina is a beautiful and wondrous structure, and it has some really weird cells. Retina by Cajal (source)Retinal Ganglion Cells (RGC) have all sorts of differentiating characteristics. Some are directly sensitive to brightness (like rods and cones), while some are sensitive to the specific direction that a bar is traveling. I am discussing really amazing new techniques to see inside cells this month, and have already posted about the magic that is Array Tomography. Today we'll look at anoth........ Read more »
Briggman KL, Helmstaedter M, & Denk W. (2011) Wiring specificity in the direction-selectivity circuit of the retina. Nature, 471(7337), 183-8. PMID: 21390125
- April 17, 2013
- 05:34 PM
- 138 views
Van Gogh was afraid of the moon and other lies
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
I remember the first time I realized just how easily false information gets spread about.A terrifying starry nightI was in French class in high school. Our homework had been to find out 1 interesting fact about Van Gogh and tell it to the class. When it was my turn, I said some boring small fact that I no longer remember. My friend sitting behind me, however, had a fascinating fact: When Van Gogh was a young child, he was actually afraid of the moon.The teacher and the class were all quite impre........ Read more »
Lewandowsky, S., Ecker, U., Seifert, C., Schwarz, N., & Cook, J. (2012) Misinformation and Its Correction: Continued Influence and Successful Debiasing. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 13(3), 106-131. DOI: 10.1177/1529100612451018
- April 13, 2013
- 10:54 AM
- 96 views
Seeing Inside Cells: Array Tomography
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
I wrote a lot about dopamine and its complicated nature last month after coming back from the IBAGs conference, so for a change of pace, I'll talk about some truly amazing new techniques that allow us to see inside cells with unprecedented resolution and at unprecedented volumes.I've previously discussed some traditional techniques for visualizing specific details in neurons, and this month I'm going to talk about some of the newest fanciest ways to look at cellular scale information. Firs........ Read more »
Micheva KD, Busse B, Weiler NC, O'Rourke N, & Smith SJ. (2010) Single-synapse analysis of a diverse synapse population: proteomic imaging methods and markers. Neuron, 68(4), 639-53. PMID: 21092855
- April 4, 2013
- 11:26 AM
- 118 views
Neurons and New Newt Legs
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
Salamanders are amazing and mystical creatures. Salamanders and their amazing leg-growing superpower (source)Not because they can survive in fire (they can't), but because they can regrow amputated limbs.A paper in 2007 investigates exactly what neural signals are required for this amazing superpower. Newt Amputee (Kumar et al., 2007)This paper brings together two interesting things about salamander (newt) leg growth.1. The salamander arm 'knows' where it was cut. If it is cut at the wrist it on........ Read more »
Kumar A, Godwin JW, Gates PB, Garza-Garcia AA, & Brockes JP. (2007) Molecular basis for the nerve dependence of limb regeneration in an adult vertebrate. Science (New York, N.Y.), 318(5851), 772-7. PMID: 17975060
- March 26, 2013
- 06:42 PM
- 198 views
Advice vs Victim-blaming: a proposed study on #safetytipsforladies
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
So there has been a lot of noise about whether giving women 'safety tips' to avoid being raped is a form of 'victim blaming'.Don't get Raped (source)This culminated in a great hashtag (as many things do). Follow #safetytipsforladies to see some lovely tips for avoiding rape.For example:Don't be anywhere. 100% of rapes happen in places and locations. #safetytipsforladies— Conna Stevenson (@1000DaysOfRain) March 25, 2013Others suggest simply not being a woman, not ever drinking anything, not eve........ Read more »
Bieneck S, & Krahé B. (2011) Blaming the victim and exonerating the perpetrator in cases of rape and robbery: is there a double standard?. Journal of interpersonal violence, 26(9), 1785-97. PMID: 20587449
- March 25, 2013
- 08:38 AM
- 159 views
Guest Post: AMPA Receptors are not Necessary for long term potentiation
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
Today's post is brought to you by @BabyAttachMode, who is an electrophysiologist and blogger. Today we are blog swapping! I have a post over at her blog and her post about AMPA receptors and LTP is here. So enjoy, and when you're done reading about the newest advances in synaptic plasticity here, you can head over to InBabyAttachMode and read about my personal life. AMPA Receptors are not Necessary for long term potentiationScience is most interesting to me when you’re testing a hypo........ Read more »
Granger AJ, Shi Y, Lu W, Cerpas M, & Nicoll RA. (2013) LTP requires a reserve pool of glutamate receptors independent of subunit type. Nature, 493(7433), 495-500. PMID: 23235828
Sheng M, Malinow R, & Huganir R. (2013) Neuroscience: Strength in numbers. Nature, 493(7433), 482-3. PMID: 23344353
- March 19, 2013
- 04:41 PM
- 149 views
What is up with the "Dopamine Project"?
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
Someone is trying to make me eat my words.yum. (source)That someone is the Dopamine Project. I am on record as saying "It is better for the public to learn simplified bite-size science morsels than to learn nothing at all." And my specific example was that it's better for people to know that 'dopamine is a reward molecule' than to not even know the term dopamine.But sometimes things just go too far. The "Dopamine Project" is a website run by Charles Lyell with a stated 'self-help' purpose: "The ........ Read more »
Shermer M. (2011) What is pseudoscience?. Scientific American, 305(3), 92. PMID: 21870452
- March 15, 2013
- 01:26 PM
- 182 views
Is it 'Important' or is it 'valuable'?
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
We've recently discussed dopamine as a reward prediction signal. But that is really just the start of the complicated dopamine story. Dopamine's role in reward and punishment (by the hiking artist)Some research groups have also found that dopamine neurons respond to aversive stimuli, like an air puff to the face or an electric shock. This finding seems to be be completely incompatible with the idea that dopamine is a signal for reward. Luckily some scientists took the time to try to resolve this........ Read more »
Bromberg-Martin ES, Matsumoto M, & Hikosaka O. (2010) Dopamine in motivational control: rewarding, aversive, and alerting. Neuron, 68(5), 815-34. PMID: 21144997
- March 9, 2013
- 04:07 PM
- 207 views
Dopamine and Reward Prediction Error
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
I am back from the IBAGS conference and full of new information! I plan to blog about tons of amazing things over the next month or so, but today we'll start with some foundation building.Dopamine nails (source)The IBAGS (international basal ganglia society) meeting is all about the basal ganglia (which includes the striatum), and as you may know, dopamine is a super important molecule for the proper function of the striatum (it is the dopamine cells that die in Parkinson's Disease).There were m........ Read more »
Schultz W. (1998) Predictive reward signal of dopamine neurons. Journal of neurophysiology, 80(1), 1-27. PMID: 9658025
- February 27, 2013
- 09:48 AM
- 253 views
GABA, how exciting!
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
I would like to thank my good friend Anonymous for asking me a great question on a previous post. Anonymous asks: "Are there any known transmitters in the NS that activate both inhibitory receptor subtypes AND excitatory receptor subtypes? Or does every known transmitter activate EITHER a bunch of excitatory subtypes OR a bunch of inhibitory subtypes?" (btw. This doesn't qualify as a LMAYQ post because it's a real true question that someone directly asked, not a search term)While I don'........ Read more »
Chiang PH, Wu PY, Kuo TW, Liu YC, Chan CF, Chien TC, Cheng JK, Huang YY, Chiu CD, & Lien CC. (2012) GABA is depolarizing in hippocampal dentate granule cells of the adolescent and adult rats. The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience, 32(1), 62-7. PMID: 22219270
- February 24, 2013
- 01:00 PM
- 268 views
Scientizing Art
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
I've always been fascinated with the way the eye moves around a piece of art. Andrew Wyeth's "Christina's World" (or as I looked up "that painting of a girl in a field looking at a house")This piece by Andrew Wyeth is an obvious example of an artist completely controlling your gaze. There are pretty much no options here. You look at the girl and then you follow her gaze to the house. You probably then take a quick glance at that other house/barn to the left, and then maybe follow the edge of the........ Read more »
Massaro D, Savazzi F, Di Dio C, Freedberg D, Gallese V, Gilli G, & Marchetti A. (2012) When art moves the eyes: a behavioral and eye-tracking study. PloS one, 7(5). PMID: 22624007
- February 21, 2013
- 06:37 PM
- 224 views
Birthing new neurons at night
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
By now it's well established that adults can grow new neurons.Growing Neurons (source)But how, when and why these neurons grow is currently under investigation. A 2008 paper attempts to answer the 'when' of neurogenesis. They labeled (PH3) cells in the mouse hippocampus (dentate gyrus to be specific), and counted how many cells were currently going through mitosis at different times of day. They found that during the dark phase, more cells were PH3-positive, indicating that more cells were ........ Read more »
Tamai S, Sanada K, & Fukada Y. (2008) Time-of-day-dependent enhancement of adult neurogenesis in the hippocampus. PloS one, 3(12). PMID: 19048107
- February 14, 2013
- 10:38 AM
- 245 views
It's not you, it's my birth control
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
So, Valentine's Day, what better time to question the foundations of your relationship?It's my brain that loves you (source)Well, part of your relationship may be based on your Major Histocompatibility Complex (MHC) compatibility. The MHC is a cluster of genes that define which antigens get expressed on white blood cells. It is thought to control the ability of the body to recognize pathogens as 'other.' It is also thought that the more varied the genes in your MHC are, the more resist........ Read more »
Roberts SC, Gosling LM, Carter V, & Petrie M. (2008) MHC-correlated odour preferences in humans and the use of oral contraceptives. Proceedings. Biological sciences / The Royal Society, 275(1652), 2715-22. PMID: 18700206
- February 10, 2013
- 04:35 PM
- 314 views
Why scientists should play games
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
I have just finished reading Jane McGonigal's book Reality is Broken: Why games make us better and how they can change the world. It is a fascinating book which presents a strong case for games (including video games) doing good in the world.Reality is Broken by Jane McGonigalI have to admit, part of me wanted to read this book to make me feel better about my own video game habit. It certainly helped solidify the vague ideas I had about what good they might be doing me.Specifically, the book mad........ Read more »
Ferguson, C. (2011) Reality is broken, and the video game research field along with it. PsycCRITIQUES, 56(48). DOI: 10.1037/a0026131
Farhangi, S. (2012) Reality is broken to be rebuilt: how a gamer’s mindset can show science educators new ways of contribution to science and world?. Cultural Studies of Science Education, 7(4), 1037-1044. DOI: 10.1007/s11422-012-9426-y
- February 6, 2013
- 07:09 PM
- 279 views
JoVE: god of thunder, journal of techniques
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
If you don't know about the Journal of Visualized Experiments, now is the time to learn.god of thunder, journal of techniques (source)Methods sections of papers should contain enough detail that a scientist reading it could replicate the results of the paper. But this is rarely the case. Research in computational neuroscience has an advantage because the actual code used to run the simulations can be deposited and downloaded. But for experimental work, the nuances of exactly how to do each ........ Read more »
Palanca, A., & Sagasti, A. (2013) Optogenetic Activation of Zebrafish Somatosensory Neurons using ChEF-tdTomato. Journal of Visualized Experiments. DOI: 10.3791/50184
- February 2, 2013
- 12:04 PM
- 211 views
LMAYQ: Let me do your homework for you
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
Sometimes reading the textbook is just too hard. And sometimes it's much easier just to type your exact homework question into a search engine and find the answer. Before we get started you might want to take a look at Smith and Wren (2010) "What is Plagiarism and how can I avoid it?" This edition of Let Me Answer Your Questions will address 'homework questions.' As always, you can find previous LMAYQ questions here.Tough Homework Questions are for the Internet (source)1. "cells that f........ Read more »
Smith N Jr, & Wren KR. (2010) Ethical and legal aspects part 2: plagiarism--"what is it and how do I avoid it?". Journal of perianesthesia nursing : official journal of the American Society of PeriAnesthesia Nurses / American Society of PeriAnesthesia Nurses, 25(5), 327-30. PMID: 20875892
- January 30, 2013
- 04:58 PM
- 240 views
Intuition or a sense of Smell?
by TheCellularScale in The Cellular Scale
I've long been fascinated by the idea that those feelings often attributed to 'intuition' or 'following your gut' might occur physiologically in the form of odor cues that we don't consciously register.Intuition or Olfactuation? (source)An example of this might me when you can just 'tell something is wrong' in a situation and decide to leave, and later found out that something bad happened later that evening. These sorts of stories are often used as evidence that people have psychic powers of so........ Read more »
de Groot JH, Smeets MA, Kaldewaij A, Duijndam MJ, & Semin GR. (2012) Chemosignals communicate human emotions. Psychological science, 23(11), 1417-24. PMID: 23019141
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