Department of Genetics, Silberman Institute of Life Science, Edmond J. Safra Campus, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel.
Department of Statistics and Data Science, Center for Interdisciplinary Data Research, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel.
BMC Biol. 2024 Aug 15;22(1):173. doi: 10.1186/s12915-024-01977-z.
Sensory systems evolved intricate designs to accurately encode perplexing environments. However, this encoding task may become particularly challenging for animals harboring a small number of sensory neurons. Here, we studied how the compact resource-limited chemosensory system of Caenorhabditis elegans uniquely encodes a range of chemical stimuli.
We find that each stimulus is encoded using a small and unique subset of neurons, where only a portion of the encoding neurons sense the stimulus directly, and the rest are recruited via inter-neuronal communication. Furthermore, while most neurons show stereotypical response dynamics, some neurons exhibit versatile dynamics that are either stimulus specific or network-activity dependent. Notably, it is the collective dynamics of all responding neurons which provides valuable information that ultimately enhances stimulus identification, particularly when required to discriminate between closely related stimuli.
Together, these findings demonstrate how a compact and resource-limited chemosensory system can efficiently encode and discriminate a diverse range of chemical stimuli.
感觉系统进化出复杂的设计，以准确地编码复杂的环境。然而，对于拥有少量感觉神经元的动物来说，这种编码任务可能会变得特别具有挑战性。在这里，我们研究了秀丽隐杆线虫有限的化学感觉系统如何独特地编码一系列化学刺激。
我们发现，每种刺激都使用一小部分独特的神经元进行编码，其中只有一部分编码神经元直接感知刺激，其余部分通过神经元间的通信被招募。此外，虽然大多数神经元表现出刻板的反应动力学，但一些神经元表现出灵活的动力学，这些动力学要么是刺激特异性的，要么是网络活动依赖性的。值得注意的是，正是所有反应神经元的集体动力学提供了有价值的信息，最终增强了刺激识别，特别是在需要区分密切相关的刺激时。
总之，这些发现表明，一个紧凑和资源有限的化学感觉系统如何能够有效地编码和区分广泛的化学刺激。
