U19NS123716

State-Dependent Decision-Making in Brainwide Neural Circuits - Summary/Abstract

Overall, U19 animals constantly make decisions, such as how to evaluate a potential threat or where to look for food. Yet, the same animal in the same environment can produce different decisions on different occasions because its internal state interacts powerfully with external inputs to determine behavior. This proposal's overarching goal is to understand how internal states influence decisions and to identify the underlying neural mechanisms.

In a mouse decision-making task, these experiments will examine the effects of three types of internal state changes: those arising spontaneously with engagement and disengagement in a task, those resulting from changing expectations during the task, and those resulting from learning within and across days. To determine how internal states affect brain activity and behavior, the team will apply cutting-edge technical advances on a brainwide scale, including statistical tools to infer internal states from behavior; simultaneous recordings from large populations of neurons across many regions during behavior and during optogenetic perturbations; assays that map functionally and molecularly defined cell-type-specific, cross-region connectivity; and computational approaches to model how cross-region neural communication depends on internal states.

These ambitious goals go beyond the capabilities of an individual laboratory and are ideally suited for an already-productive consortium. This team is part of the International Brain Laboratory, which has already developed a standardized mouse decision-making task and standardized methods for training, neural measurement, and data analysis, along with a working, scalable infrastructure for sharing data. The proposed research leverages this existing infrastructure and takes it in a new direction.

Projects 1-5 will examine simultaneously recorded population activity, evaluate causality, study neural activity and behavior during learning in normal and autism model mice, identify cell types by measuring neuronal activity, gene expression, and axonal projection patterns in the same populations of neurons, and build a comprehensive computational model of all these experimental results. Cores A-D will support the collection, replicability, management, and analysis of the large datasets produced by this brainwide examination of neural circuits.

Taken together, the proposed research will rigorously define the neural basis of multiple internal states and evaluate their impact on the flow of decision-relevant information through the brain. The results will greatly advance the field by generating a comprehensive, mechanistic understanding of how internal states are reflected in the brain and how these states interact with external inputs to guide decisions. Moreover, the team will produce and disseminate open-source tools and protocols that will enable other laboratories to collect and manage large-scale datasets produced through brainwide measurements.

The Trustees Of Columbia University In The City Of New York

(1) TO SUPPORT EXTRAMURAL RESEARCH FUNDED BY THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF NEUROLOGICAL DISORDERS AND STROKE (NINDS) INCLUDING: BASIC RESEARCH THAT EXPLORES THE FUNDAMENTAL STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION OF THE BRAIN AND THE NERVOUS SYSTEM, RESEARCH TO UNDERSTAND THE CAUSES AND ORIGINS OF PATHOLOGICAL CONDITIONS OF THE NERVOUS SYSTEM WITH THE GOAL OF PREVENTING THESE DISORDERS, RESEARCH ON THE NATURAL COURSE OF NEUROLOGICAL DISORDERS, IMPROVED METHODS OF DISEASE PREVENTION, NEW METHODS OF DIAGNOSIS AND TREATMENT, DRUG DEVELOPMENT, DEVELOPMENT OF NEURAL DEVICES, CLINICAL TRIALS, AND RESEARCH TRAINING IN BASIC, TRANSLATIONAL AND CLINICAL NEUROSCIENCE. THE INSTITUTE IS THE LARGEST FUNDER OF BASIC NEUROSCIENCE IN THE US AND SUPPORTS RESEARCH ON TOPICS INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO: DEVELOPMENT OF THE NERVOUS SYSTEM, INCLUDING NEUROGENESIS AND PROGENITOR CELL BIOLOGY, SIGNAL TRANSDUCTION IN DEVELOPMENT AND PLASTICITY, AND PROGRAMMED CELL DEATH, SYNAPSE FORMATION, FUNCTION, AND PLASTICITY, LEARNING AND MEMORY, CHANNELS, TRANSPORTERS, AND PUMPS, CIRCUIT FORMATION AND MODULATION, BEHAVIORAL AND COGNITIVE NEUROSCIENCE, SENSORIMOTOR LEARNING, INTEGRATION AND EXECUTIVE FUNCTION, NEUROENDOCRINE SYSTEMS, SLEEP AND CIRCADIAN RHYTHMS, AND SENSORY AND MOTOR SYSTEMS. IN ADDITION, THE INSTITUTE SUPPORTS BASIC, TRANSLATIONAL AND CLINICAL STUDIES ON A NUMBER OF DISORDERS OF THE NERVOUS SYSTEM INCLUDING (BUT NOT LIMITED TO): STROKE, TRAUMATIC INJURY TO THE BRAIN, SPINAL CORD AND PERIPHERAL NERVOUS SYSTEM, NEURODEGENERATIVE DISORDERS, MOVEMENT DISORDERS, BRAIN TUMORS, CONVULSIVE DISORDERS, INFECTIOUS DISORDERS OF THE BRAIN AND NERVOUS SYSTEM, IMMUNE DISORDERS OF THE BRAIN AND NERVOUS SYSTEM, INCLUDING MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS, DISORDERS RELATED TO SLEEP, AND PAIN. PROGRAMMATIC AREAS, WHICH ARE PRIMARILY SUPPORTED BY THE DIVISION OF NEUROSCIENCE, ARE ALSO SUPPORTED BY THE DIVISION OF EXTRAMURAL ACTIVITIES, THE DIVISION OF TRANSLATIONAL RESEARCH, THE DIVISION OF CLINICAL RESEARCH, THE OFFICE OF TRAINING AND WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT, THE OFFICE OF PROGRAMS TO ENHANCE NEUROSCIENCE WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT, AND THE OFFICE OF INTERNATIONAL ACTIVITIES. (2) TO EXPAND AND IMPROVE THE SMALL BUSINESS INNOVATION RESEARCH (SBIR) PROGRAM, TO INCREASE PRIVATE SECTOR COMMERCIALIZATION OF INNOVATIONS DERIVED FROM FEDERAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, TO INCREASE SMALL BUSINESS PARTICIPATION IN FEDERAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, AND TO FOSTER AND ENCOURAGE PARTICIPATION OF SOCIALLY AND ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND WOMEN-OWNED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS IN TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION. TO UTILIZE THE SMALL BUSINESS TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER (STTR) PROGRAM, TO STIMULATE AND FOSTER SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION THROUGH COOPERATIVE RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT CARRIED OUT BETWEEN SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND RESEARCH INSTITUTIONS, TO FOSTER TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER BETWEEN SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND RESEARCH INSTITUTIONS, TO INCREASE PRIVATE SECTOR COMMERCIALIZATION OF INNOVATIONS DERIVED FROM FEDERAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, AND TO FOSTER AND ENCOURAGE PARTICIPATION OF SOCIALLY AND ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND WOMEN-OWNED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS IN TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION.

93.372 - 21st Century Cures Act - Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies

National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NNDS) [HHS - NIH]

New York, New York 10027 United States

Single Zip Code

BRAIN Initiative: Team-Research BRAIN Circuit Programs - TeamBCP (U19 Clinical Trial Not Allowed) (RFA-NS-19-003)

Amendment Since initial award the total obligations have increased 505% from $3,000,000 to $18,155,129.