Many animals rely on a representation of head direction for flexible, goal-directed navigation. In insects, a compass-like head direction representation is maintained in a conserved brain region called the central complex. This head direction representation is updated by self-motion information and by tethering to sensory cues in the surroundings through a plasticity mechanism. However, under natural settings, some of these sensory cues may temporarily disappear—for example, when clouds hide the sun—and prominent landmarks at different distances from the insect may move across the animal’s field of view during translation, creating potential conflicts for a neural compass. We used two-photon calcium imaging in head-fixed Drosophila behaving in virtual reality to monitor the fly’s compass during navigation in immersive naturalistic environments with approachable local landmarks. We found that the fly’s compass remains stable even in these settings by tethering to available global cues, likely preserving the animal’s ability to perform compass-driven behaviors such as maintaining a constant heading.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.
Description
Maintaining a stable head direction representation in naturalistic visual environments | bioRxiv
%0 Journal Article
%1 Haberkern2022.05.17.492284
%A Haberkern, Hannah
%A Chitnis, Shivam S
%A Hubbard, Philip M
%A Goulet, Tobias
%A Hermundstad, Ann M
%A Jayaraman, Vivek
%D 2022
%I Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
%J bioRxiv
%K ag_haberkern_high haberkern_high
%R 10.1101/2022.05.17.492284
%T Maintaining a stable head direction representation in naturalistic visual environments
%U https://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2022/05/18/2022.05.17.492284
%X Many animals rely on a representation of head direction for flexible, goal-directed navigation. In insects, a compass-like head direction representation is maintained in a conserved brain region called the central complex. This head direction representation is updated by self-motion information and by tethering to sensory cues in the surroundings through a plasticity mechanism. However, under natural settings, some of these sensory cues may temporarily disappear—for example, when clouds hide the sun—and prominent landmarks at different distances from the insect may move across the animal’s field of view during translation, creating potential conflicts for a neural compass. We used two-photon calcium imaging in head-fixed Drosophila behaving in virtual reality to monitor the fly’s compass during navigation in immersive naturalistic environments with approachable local landmarks. We found that the fly’s compass remains stable even in these settings by tethering to available global cues, likely preserving the animal’s ability to perform compass-driven behaviors such as maintaining a constant heading.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.
@article{Haberkern2022.05.17.492284,
abstract = {Many animals rely on a representation of head direction for flexible, goal-directed navigation. In insects, a compass-like head direction representation is maintained in a conserved brain region called the central complex. This head direction representation is updated by self-motion information and by tethering to sensory cues in the surroundings through a plasticity mechanism. However, under natural settings, some of these sensory cues may temporarily disappear{\textemdash}for example, when clouds hide the sun{\textemdash}and prominent landmarks at different distances from the insect may move across the animal{\textquoteright}s field of view during translation, creating potential conflicts for a neural compass. We used two-photon calcium imaging in head-fixed Drosophila behaving in virtual reality to monitor the fly{\textquoteright}s compass during navigation in immersive naturalistic environments with approachable local landmarks. We found that the fly{\textquoteright}s compass remains stable even in these settings by tethering to available global cues, likely preserving the animal{\textquoteright}s ability to perform compass-driven behaviors such as maintaining a constant heading.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.},
added-at = {2023-12-13T10:11:13.000+0100},
author = {Haberkern, Hannah and Chitnis, Shivam S and Hubbard, Philip M and Goulet, Tobias and Hermundstad, Ann M and Jayaraman, Vivek},
biburl = {https://www.bibsonomy.org/bibtex/2335eb8ae69f7f1e35e0c4e206ab58b2c/zoologieii},
description = {Maintaining a stable head direction representation in naturalistic visual environments | bioRxiv},
doi = {10.1101/2022.05.17.492284},
elocation-id = {2022.05.17.492284},
eprint = {https://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2022/05/18/2022.05.17.492284.full.pdf},
interhash = {a94058a5dc96446a8b44294ae271e0c9},
intrahash = {335eb8ae69f7f1e35e0c4e206ab58b2c},
journal = {bioRxiv},
keywords = {ag_haberkern_high haberkern_high},
publisher = {Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory},
timestamp = {2023-12-13T10:39:18.000+0100},
title = {Maintaining a stable head direction representation in naturalistic visual environments},
url = {https://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2022/05/18/2022.05.17.492284},
year = 2022
}