Temporal attention, essential for navigating our daily lives, remains a mystery in terms of its neural underpinnings, particularly regarding whether exogenous or endogenous sources for this attention rely on the same brain structures. This research highlights the correlation between musical rhythm training and improved exogenous temporal attention, which is further supported by more consistent timing within sensory and motor processing regions of the brain. While these benefits were seen, they did not apply to internally driven temporal attention, showcasing that different brain areas are associated with temporal attention depending on the origin of the timing signals.

The ability to abstract is enhanced by sleep, but the precise processes responsible for this remain shrouded in mystery. Our exploration aimed to identify whether reactivation during sleep could indeed improve this particular process. Abstraction problems were paired with sounds, and these sound pairings were subsequently replayed during slow-wave sleep (SWS) or rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, triggering memory reactivation in 27 human participants, including 19 females. A demonstrable enhancement in performance on abstract problems presented in REM sleep distinguished it from SWS sleep, the results indicated. To our surprise, the cue-dependent enhancement in performance wasn't significant until a subsequent test one week after the intervention, indicating that REM might trigger a chain of plasticity processes needing more time to unfold. Consequently, memory-related trigger sounds engendered unique neural responses within the Rapid Eye Movement sleep cycle, but not within the Slow Wave Sleep phase. From our study, we infer that memory reactivation in REM sleep could plausibly facilitate the extraction of visual rules, yet this effect takes time to fully manifest. Sleep is a known facilitator of rule abstraction, but the possibility of active manipulation of this process and the determination of the most important sleep stage remain unknown. During sleep, targeted memory reactivation (TMR) employs sensory cues linked to prior learning to promote memory consolidation. During REM sleep, we demonstrate that TMR facilitates the intricate recombination of information crucial for formulating rules. Furthermore, our results reveal that this qualitative REM-related advantage emerges within a week of learning, indicating that the integration of memories could require a more gradual form of plasticity.

The intricate workings of the amygdala, hippocampus, and subgenual cortex area 25 (A25) contribute to complex cognitive-emotional processes. The pathways of interaction between the hippocampus and A25, and their postsynaptic targets in the amygdala, still hold a significant degree of mystery. Employing neural tracers, we investigated the interactions between pathways from A25 and the hippocampus and excitatory and inhibitory microcircuits in the amygdala, in rhesus monkeys of both sexes, across various scales of analysis. The hippocampus and A25 were found to innervate the basolateral (BL) amygdalar nucleus, with some of the sites being distinct and others overlapping. With unique hippocampal pathways, the intrinsic paralaminar basolateral nucleus is heavily innervated and exhibits plasticity related properties. Conversely, orbital A25 exhibited preferential innervation of a distinct intrinsic network, the intercalated masses, an inhibitory web that regulates amygdalar autonomic responses and curtails fear-motivated actions. Using high-resolution confocal and electron microscopy (EM), we determined that, within the basolateral amygdala (BL), inhibitory postsynaptic targets from both hippocampal and A25 pathways exhibited a marked preference for synaptic connections with calretinin (CR) neurons. These calretinin neurons, well-known for their disinhibitory role, potentially amplify the excitatory drive in the amygdala. The powerful parvalbumin (PV) neurons, targeted by A25 pathways in addition to other inhibitory postsynaptic sites, may dynamically adjust the amplification of neuronal assemblies within the BL, which in turn influence the internal state. In contrast to other neural pathways, hippocampal pathways innervate calbindin (CB) inhibitory neurons, thus impacting specific excitatory inputs for understanding context and the learning of accurate associations. The selective disruption of complex cognitive and emotional processes in psychiatric disorders may be linked to the specific patterns of innervation from the hippocampus and A25 to the amygdala. The effect of A25 on diverse amygdalar processes, from emotional expression to fear learning, is mediated by its innervation of the basal complex and the intrinsic intercalated nuclei. Plasticity-related intrinsic amygdalar nuclei show unique interaction with hippocampal pathways, implying a flexible method of processing signals in the context of learning. selleck kinase inhibitor The basolateral amygdala, implicated in fear conditioning, demonstrates preferential interaction between hippocampal and A25 neurons with disinhibitory cells, suggesting a heightened excitatory response. Diverging in their innervation of different inhibitory neuron classes, the two pathways suggest circuit-specific characteristics susceptible to impairment in psychiatric illnesses.

To assess the specific contribution of the transferrin (Tf) cycle to oligodendrocyte development and function, we disrupted the transferrin receptor (Tfr) gene expression in oligodendrocyte progenitor cells (OPCs) in mice of either sex via the Cre/lox system. This ablation effectively eradicates iron incorporation through the Tf cycle while leaving intact other functions of the Tf. Mice deficient in Tfr, particularly within NG2 or Sox10-expressing oligodendrocyte precursor cells (OPCs), exhibited a hypomyelination phenotype. The impact of Tfr deletion extended to compromised OPC iron absorption, as well as to disruptions in OPC differentiation and myelination. Reduced myelinated axon counts and fewer mature oligodendrocytes were observed in the brains of Tfr cKO animals. The ablation of Tfr in adult mice failed to affect the existing population of mature oligodendrocytes or the subsequent production of myelin. selleck kinase inhibitor RNA sequencing analysis of Tfr cKO oligodendrocyte progenitor cells (OPCs) revealed a disruption in gene regulation associated with OPC maturation, myelination pathways, and mitochondrial activity. TFR removal from cortical OPCs led to the disruption of the mTORC1 signaling pathway, further affecting epigenetic mechanisms essential for gene transcription and the expression of structural mitochondrial genes. Further RNA-seq analyses were performed on oligodendrocyte progenitor cells (OPCs) in which the process of iron storage was compromised by removing the ferritin heavy chain. The regulation of genes linked to iron transport, antioxidant activity, and mitochondrial function is abnormal in these OPCs. During postnatal development, our results implicate the Tf cycle as central to iron homeostasis in oligodendrocyte progenitor cells (OPCs). Furthermore, we suggest that both iron uptake via the transferrin receptor (Tfr) and intracellular iron storage via ferritin are critical for energy production, mitochondrial activity, and proper OPC maturation. RNA-seq analysis underscored the critical roles of both Tfr-mediated iron uptake and ferritin iron storage in ensuring proper mitochondrial function, energy production, and OPC maturation.

Bistable perception manifests as an oscillation between two different perceptual models of a stationary stimulus. Neurophysiological experiments on bistable perception usually categorize neural recordings according to the presented stimuli, thereafter examining differences in neuronal activity across these categorized periods, guided by subjects' perceptual reports. Competitive attractors and Bayesian inference, amongst other modeling principles, are instrumental in computational studies that replicate the statistical properties of percept durations. However, connecting neuro-behavioral results to theoretical models demands an investigation of single-trial dynamic data. We describe an algorithm to extract non-stationary time series features from single-trial electrocorticography (ECoG) data. During perceptual alternations in an auditory triplet streaming task, ECoG recordings (5 minutes in duration) from the primary auditory cortex of six subjects (four male, two female) were subjected to the proposed algorithm's analysis. We find two emergent neuronal feature sets present in every trial block. The stimulus elicits a stereotypical response, which is embodied in an ensemble of periodic functions. The other category exhibits more fleeting characteristics, encoding the dynamics of bistable perception across various timeframes: minutes (for alternations within a single trial), seconds (for the duration of individual perceptions), and milliseconds (for the transitions between perceptions). Perceptual states corresponded with a slowly drifting rhythm within the second ensemble's structure, coupled with oscillators exhibiting phase shifts at the points of perceptual changes. The projections of individual ECoG trials onto these features reveal invariant low-dimensional geometric structures resembling attractors across various subjects and stimulus types. selleck kinase inhibitor Neural evidence supports computational models, featuring oscillatory attractors. The feature extraction approaches detailed here are applicable across recording modalities, appropriate when hypothesized low-dimensional dynamics are thought to represent the underlying neural system. This algorithm, designed for the extraction of neuronal characteristics within bistable auditory perception, leverages large-scale single-trial data, unaffected by subjective perceptual reporting. The algorithm discerns the temporal intricacies of perception across various timescales, from minutes (intra-trial fluctuations) to seconds (the durations of individual sensations), and even milliseconds (the timing of shifts), and further differentiates the neural encoding of the stimulus from the neural encoding of the perceptual experience. Lastly, our study uncovers a set of latent variables demonstrating alternating dynamic behavior along a low-dimensional manifold, echoing the patterns seen in attractor-based models for perceptual bistability.