Alex M Winsor

Systems and circuit neuroscience need an evolutionary perspective To identify fundamental neuroscientific principles that generalize across species, neuroscientists must frame their research through an evolutionary lens.

To identify fundamental neuroscientific principles that generalize across species, systems and circuits, neuroscientists must embrace an evolutionary perspective, argue Karl Farrow and @katjareinhard.bsky.social.

#neuroskyence

www.thetransmitter.org/systems-neur...

The hidden life of trees. I try to listen to audiobooks while hiking!

A cell type in the visual system that receives feedback about limb movement Hartman et al. describe a cell type in the Drosophila visual system that is activated during head grooming through visual and non-visual signals arising from foreleg movements. These neurons inhibit a...

New paper from our lab! This was such a fun project to be a part of - proof that sometimes following a spurious observations down the rabbit hole leads to awesome findings.

www.cell.com/current-biol...

Divergent synaptic dynamics originate parallel pathways for computation and behavior in an olfactory circuit Kim et al. investigate how the Drosophila olfactory system dynamically transforms odor information. They discover that distinct synaptic dynamics from individual projection neurons underlie different ...

A single neuron in fruit flies can trigger two different behaviors in response to the same odor.

www.cell.com/current-biol...

Repeated evolution of reduced visual investment at the onset of ecological speciation in high-altitude Heliconius butterflies Abstract. Colonization of new habitats is typically followed by divergent selection acting on traits that are immediately important for fitness. For exampl

🚨New paper out on "Repeated #evolution of reduced visual investment at the onset of ecological speciation in high-altitude Heliconius #butterflies" by @gadusmo.bsky.social et al. @dickmerrill.bsky.social @ebablab.bsky.social ↘️ doi.org/10.1093/evle... ↙️ 🦋🧠💙💕 #neuroplasticity #opticlobe #sntennallobe

🚨 New review out: " #Neuroanatomy of blood-feeding #arthropods" by Jessica A. Hearn and @gabriellawolff.bsky.social in Current Opinion in #Insect #Science 🧠🧪🦟🕷🩸 (anyone noticed the fact that we lack relevant arthropod smileys!?) #bedbugs #lice #ticks
Enjoy reading ↘️ doi.org/10.1016/j.co... ↙️

Mapping the adaptive landscape of Batesian mimicry using 3D-printed stimuli - Nature Birds have an excellent ability to learn to discriminate harmless insects from those that they mimic on the basis of subtle differences in appearance.

Why do imperfect mimics (such as many hoverflies) exist? We created 3D printed replicas of flies, wasps and our own custom intermediates and then "asked" various predators what they thought of our 3D stimuli. Read all about it here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

We are looking for early carrer researchers who want to share their fascination for Neuroethology by introducing their work.

The genome of a sea spider corroborates a shared Hox cluster motif in arthropods with a reduced posterior tagma - BMC Biology Background Chelicerate evolution is contentiously debated, with recent studies challenging traditional phylogenetic hypotheses and scenarios of major evolutionary events, like terrestrialization. Sea ...

The lab is proud to have contributed to the first chromosome-level sea spider genome! Many thanks to Niko Papadopoulos, Georg Brenneis, and Andi Wanninger, who spearheaded the work! #pycnogonida

bmcbiol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....

Wow that looks cool!

Yesterday evening the Neuroethology Gordon Research Conference started at the Renaissance Tuscany II 🇮🇹

Our new paper on structure and growth of Porpita porpita - rdcu.be/etcY6 . Like Velella and Physalia, this is a colonial cnidarian that floats at the surface of the Ocean. The whole colony arises form a single embryo through clonal growth that gives rise to many specialized bodies.

Our new paper is out: "The 3D architecture of the ctenophore aboral organ & the evolution of complex integrative centers in animals.

We reveal a remarkable cell type diversity, nerve net condensation, a multilayered circuit & gene expression profiles.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... #ctenophores

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences: Vol 380, No 1929

Selection Shapes Diverse Animal Minds: our special issue of @royalsocietypublishing.org Phil Trans B on the diverse evolutionary processes underlying cognitive evolution is out today. Thanks to all our contributors! royalsocietypublishing.org/toc/rstb/202...

Biological point-light displays scanning by the principal eyes of a jumping spider The semi-rigid structure of bodies forces animals to move in rhythmic patterns shared by all creatures with skeletons, exoskeletons, or limb connections. This pattern, known as biological motion, is i...

Can jumping spiders extract implied object shape from motion? Check out our new preprint to find out. Collab with Massimo De Agrò @neuroethology.org

doi.org/10.1101/2025...

So cool!

Graphical abstract for "Vocal communication is seasonal in social groups of wild, free-living house mice." The abstract has, from top to bottom, a title, four middle image panels, and two bottom text panels. Image title: "Vocal communication in social groups of wild-free living house mice" Middle image panels from left to right: (1) An aerial snap shot of the region where the study site is located, an agricultural landscape in rural Switzerland. (2) An image of the study site, a small barn in the forest inhabited by mice. (3) An image of a radio frequency identification (RFID) box used to track mouse social interactions. A mouse is entering the box from the left while another sits outside. (4) A spectrogram showing example vocalizations - one low frequency squeak and one ultrasonic call - recorded from an RFID box. Bottom panels: Left: Data Collection  - 10 years of RFID-based tracking data (from 6,946 mice) - 15 months of acoustic monitoring (totaling 6,594 hours) - Machine learning for vocal detection and labeling (CNN) Right: Key Findings - Vocalization is seasonal (most in spring and summer) - Vocalization is associated with the presence of pups - Vocalization is correlated with social group dynamics

Very happy to share the latest from my postdoc‬!

10 yrs of mouse social networks + 1.25 yrs of acoustic data ➡️ insight into vocalization & sociality in a wild population of your favorite lab model 🐁

paper: bit.ly/4n93yyD
data: bit.ly/4lfFBEk
code: bit.ly/4kNnMwx

#bioacoustics #neuroskyence

1/8

Fascinating work!

Cataract induction in an arthropod reveals how lens crystallins contribute to the formation of biological glass Lenses are vital components of well-functioning eyes and are crafted through the precise arrangement of proteins to achieve transparency and refractive ability. In addition to optical clarity for mini...

Highlight of this week:
One of many collaborations effort with @binturong98.bsky.social that started ~ 2022 finally got published!
We induced cataracts in the camera-type eyes of diving beetle larvae!

journals.plos.org/plosone/arti...

Work in flies suggests circadian systems aren’t the same in males and females Adult female fruit flies proved less sensitive to disturbances of their circadian system through experimental disruptions of a peptide in their brains (green). Image credit: Eva Scholz-Carlson, Indian...

Nice highlight of super cool new study from @mariadelapax.bsky.social and co-authors! Congrats to all!

www.pnas.org/post/journal...

The Neural Systems & Behavior Course at the Marine Biological Laboratory is going to be looking for a co-director. If you're a faculty member who is interested in helping to organize and run this incredible course, submit a brief statement and your CV at this website. www.mbl.edu/education/ad...

Prior cuing affects saccades to targets in the praying mantis, Sphodromantis lineola

New paper alert! We found that spatial cues can bias mantis selective attention. Less evidence for the influence of stereo disparity - but more on that soon. Great work by Theo Robert and some amazing students and good to see this out! 🧪

Read more here: journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/...

new preprint, led by @ellenlesser.bsky.social, on proprioceptive sensing of the Drosophila wing. tldr, there are a lot of proprioceptors out in the wing and they are wildly diverse and complex (eg, compared to the fly leg). just one example in this image...(1/4)

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

New preprint from the lab, led by grad student Brandon Pratt, on the encoding properties and sensorimotor function of proprioceptive limit detectors (ie, hair plates) in the fly leg.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

2025 Grass Fellows: Zeeshan Banday - University of Chicago Mechanoelectrical transduction in jellyfish Sam Chakrabarti - Max Delbruck Center Pain sensation in sharks Alex Chen - Harvard University Ctenophore nerve net development David Hildebrand - The Rockefeller University Face recognition in paper wasps Chris Hoffmann - German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases Ocean acidification and behavior in sea slugs Hannah Oberle - University of Michigan Synaptic plasticity in mouse inferior colliculus Kyra Schapiro - Brandeis University Molluscan shell patterning Alex Yarger - Imperial College London Dragonfly flight control

Looking for some good news today?

We have eight inspiring early-career scientists heading to @mblscience.bsky.social to spend the summer conducting research on topics ranging from pain sensation in sharks to ocean acidification and behavior in sea slugs.

grassfoundation.org/announcing-t...

Three amazing talks and an insightful discussion afterward! Stay tuned for the next webinar in October to see more creative early career research!

65 years after Lettvin’s bug detector neurons in the frog retina, we revisit how the retina drives behavior—from reflexes to prey capture to brain-state modulation

New review with @annaintegrated.bsky.social & @serenariccitelli.bsky.social in Annual Review of Vision Science 👇

tinyurl.com/ymp3vs4d

Spatially clustered neurons in the bat midbrain encode vocalization categories - Nature Neuroscience Using two-photon imaging in awake bats, the authors show that the inferior colliculus encodes vocalization categories as categorical primitives—spatially clustered, category-selective neurons that ena...

Categorization of vocalizations had been attributed to the cortex. With 2P-Imaging in 🦇, J Lawlor, M. Wohlgemuth, C. Moss & @kishoreneuro.bsky.social show that such a categorization already occurs at the level of the midbrain. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

@natneuro.nature.com

The ISN Newsletter for May 2025 can be found here: internationalsocietyofneuroethology.growthzoneapp.com/ap/CloudFile...

Made a quick visit to @mblscience.bsky.social! Very nostalgic