November 16th – Takaki Komiyama – Imaging neural ensembles in flexible behavior

Neuroscience Seminar Series

Friday, November 16th. 2018, 11:30 am, R229 (2rd Floor), Centre Universitaire des Saints-Pères, 45 rue des Saints-Pères, 75006 Paris

Takaki Komiyama, Professor of Neurobiology and Neurosciences, University of California San Diego, USA

Title:

Imaging neural ensembles in flexible behavior

Abstract:

With repetitive practice, animals develop novel and stereotyped movements over time, a process called motor skill learning. Motor skill learning is supported by circuit changes at multiple spatiotemporal scales. We investigate these changes by applying imaging techniques in head-fixed mice learning a motor skill. Over weeks of daily training, mice develop increasingly more stereotyped movements. With two-photon imaging in the primary motor cortex, we have identified profound changes in both microcircuit activity and synaptic structures. These studies have established that motor learning modifies the relationship between brain activity and associated movements. These activity changes coincided with cell type-specific changes in synaptic structures. I will discuss our latest results regarding the micro- and macro-scale reorganizations of cortical circuits during motor learning.

Host: Merouann Kassa (merouann.kassa@parisdescartes.fr)