Published in Current Biology
Through the combination of proteomics, genetics, and live imaging, Campbell et al. identify Pez as a novel regulator of inflammation in vivo . Pez acts in the damage-sensing, H2O2/Src42a/Draper signaling axis, wherein it dynamically clusters with Draper to enable rapid leukocyte migration to epithelial wounds in both the fly and fish.
Published in Current Biology
Draschkow et al. demonstrate that reliance on working memory is low during natural behavior, even when “holding information in mind to guide future behavior” is the very essence of the task. As searching for objects externally increases in locomotive effort, WM usage increases in a shallow and linear fashion. This trade-off affects performance.
Published in Current Biology
Bale et al. analyze neuronal activity in layer 2/3 of somatosensory cortex as mice learn to discriminate between a target and a non-target ordered sequence of whisker motion. Neurons reflect task parameters including the learned association between target sequence and licking, rather than refining their tuning to sensory features.
Published in Current Biology
It is unknown whether gastric dysrhythmias contribute to disgust avoidance. By normalizing gastric state with domperidone and measuring oculomotor avoidance of disgusting images, Nord et al. discover that domperidone reduces oculomotor disgust avoidance following an exposure task. This suggests that gastric rhythm is one cause of disgust avoidance....
Published in Current Biology
Published in Current Biology
Kinetochores need to be specialized to direct the distinctive pattern of chromosome segregation in meiosis. Borek et al. reveal the protein composition of kinetochores in meiosis and identify a critical assembly pathway that promotes meiotic kinetochore specialization.
Published in Current Biology
Bertolotti, Unterholzner et al. show that a time-dependent threshold of the transcription factor PHB governs the timing of middle cortex formation in the Arabidopsis root. PHB promotes CYCD6;1 expression in the endodermis cell non-autonomously by reducing gibberellin (GA) levels in the vascular tissue and, hence, stabilizing the GAs repressor GAI.
Published in Current Biology
Köstlbacher et al. illustrate how plasmids of intracellular bacteria in the phylum Chlamydiae have coevolved with their hosts over a billion years. By mobilizing chromosomal genes, plasmids contributed to host adaptation and might have mitigated the degenerative effects of Muller’s ratchet in this group of intracellular pathogens and symbionts.
Published in Current Biology
Maldonado et al. uncover oxytocin’s role in developing sensory cortices. In vivo , they show that oxytocin decreases the frequency and correlations of spontaneous activity patterns in V1 by specifically activating somatostatin+ interneurons. In S1, oxytocin increases both excitation and inhibition and does not affect spontaneous activity frequency....
Published in Current Biology
Novelty facilitates memory formation. Fredes et al. show that mossy cells in the ventral dentate gyrus detect environmental novelty. This information is conveyed to dorsal dentate granule cells and is necessary for novelty-induced contextual memory formation. Conversely, activating this pathway enhances contextual memory in a familiar environment.
