Compartmentalized calcium dynamics in a C. elegans interneuron encode head movement.

ABSTRACT: The confinement of neuronal activity to specific subcellular regions is a mechanism for expanding the computational properties of neurons. Although the circuit organization underlying compartmentalized activity has been studied in several systems, its cellular basis is still unknown. Here we characterize compartmentalized activity in Caenorhabditis elegans RIA interneurons, which have multiple reciprocal connections to head motor neurons and receive input from sensory pathways. We show that RIA spatially encodes head movement on a subcellular scale through axonal compartmentalization. This subcellular axonal activity is dependent on acetylcholine release from head motor neurons and is simultaneously present and additive with glutamate-dependent globally synchronized activity evoked by sens

SUBMITTER: Hendricks M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3393794 | biostudies-literature | 2012 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature