Josh Johansen

Neuroscience has a species problem If neuroscience is serious about building general principles of brain function, cross-species dialogue must become a core organizing principle.

If neuroscience is serious about building general principles of brain function, cross-species dialogue must become a core organizing principle rather than an afterthought, writes @suthanalab.bsky.social.

#neuroskyence

www.thetransmitter.org/animal-model...

1/n. I agree w/ Josh's emphasis on computationally grounded approaches, coordinated x-species work, and skepticism that emotion only encompasses constructed feelings. As he notes, hierarchical frameworks can encompass multiple levels of processing,

Thanks for weighing in, Alex. I appreciate your perspective here, and the paper you cite is an important piece of this conversation.

Preaching to the choir, and the composer 😊

Me too. Couldn't fit it into the current piece, but this is a major advantage of a cross species approach; the ability to probe the circuit and molecular mechanisms of higher order emotion across conserved structures in non-human organisms

Grateful to @emilysingerneuro.bsky.social for excellent editorial guidance on this piece.

Thanks, I was inspired by your Transmitter-emotion piece 😊

Why emotion research is stuck—and how to move it forward Studying how organisms infer indirect threats and understand changing contexts can establish a common framework that bridges species and levels of analysis.

My perspective in @thetransmitter.bsky.social on why emotion research feels stuck and how we might move forward—by focusing on how the brain uses internal brain models to shape emotional processing across species. www.thetransmitter.org/emotion/why-...

Dendritic compartment-specific spine formation in layer 5 neurons underlies cortical circuit maturation during adolescence Mouse models of schizophrenia show defects in adolescent spine formation in a specific dendritic compartment of L5 neurons.

Our new paper is out in Science Advances! We found that dendritic compartment-specific spine “formation” during adolescence is critical for cortical development. We also found that schizophrenia-related genes are important in this process. (1/6)
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

🎉 Great news! IBRO is pleased to introduce the Scientific Program Committee for the IBRO 2027 World Congress, led by Drs. Sheena Josselyn and Thiruma V. Arumugam

🔗 Discover the full committee & read the announcement: https://ow.ly/p37U50XTXqN

Congrats, Keri, so excited for you! Amazing to see your journey from UCLA to now 🎉

Body size predicts the selection of defensive behavioral strategies Survival depends on the ability to respond appropriately to threats, yet the selection of defensive behaviors varies among individuals with distinct b…

New paper from @ykneurores.bsky.social in our lab 📢
We show body size predicts defensive behavioral strategy; smaller animals adopt active avoidance, larger ones favor freezing, while sex and age don’t drive the effect. A clear demonstration that traits matter.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

IBRO announces the Scientific Program Committee for the 2027 World Congress Following a rigorous global selection process led by co-chairs Dr. Sheena Josselyn and Dr. Thiruma V. Arumugam, who aimed at establishing a scientifically broad Scientific Program Committee (SPC) for…

Excited to be working with colleagues around the world (including @drjkhokhar.bsky.social @jojolab.bsky.social and CHAIR @sjo09.bsky.social) on the @ibroorg.bsky.social World Congress in Cape Town, 2027! ibro.org/ibro-announc...

Locus coeruleus norepinephrine neurons facilitate orbitofrontal cortex remapping and behavioral flexibility Ogg et al. use in vivo imaging techniques to record activity in the locus coeruleus (LC) and the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) during a reversal learning task in freely moving rodents. They show that man...

Thrilled this is out, led by former PD Cameron Ogg (now with her own lab at @rhodescollege.bsky.social!). It was a driven by a desire to see, in real-time, how LC activity/NE release influences downstream targets in behaving animals. SO hard to do, but Cameron did it! www.cell.com/cell-reports...

How basic neuroscience has paved the path to new drugs A growing list of medications—such as zuranolone for postpartum depression, suzetrigine for pain, and the gepants class of migraine medicines—exist because of insights from basic research.

A growing list of medications—such as zuranolone for postpartum depression, suzetrigine for pain, and the gepants class of migraine medicines—exist because of insights from basic research, writes @alexkwan.bsky.social.

www.thetransmitter.org/drug-develop...

#neuroskyence

If you're at @sfn.org check out @ykneurores.bsky.social's poster on Tuesday Nov 18th morning!

EE4 - A functional input-output organization in the amygdala for emotional learning and memory

Next Tuesday!:🧠📷 Join us for the Japan Neuroscience Global Soirée-#SfN2025 Social! 📷7–9 PM 📷 Protector Brewery: San Diego craft beer, food (free while supplies last) & lively discussions! 📷 RSVP (optional): evite.me/pAvuVkpqbK 🍻

🧠🍺 Join us for the Japan Neuroscience Global Soirée-#SfN2025 Social!
📅 Tue, Nov 18 | 🕖 7–9 PM
📍 Protector Brewery: maps.app.goo.gl/Z4hmQnLSDjwZ...
San Diego craft beer, great food (free while supplies last) & lively discussions!
🔗 RSVP (optional): evite.me/pAvuVkpqbK
All welcome—spread the word! 🍻

Molecular mechanisms mediating engram ensemble retrievability state in mice Engrams, ensembles of neurons that store memories, exist along a continuum of retrievability. Normally, sensory cues can reactivate a latent engram to…

Excited to share the latest from the lab on the molecular mechanisms of silencing and un-silencing a hippocampal engram ensemble. Was fun using a variant of the EPSILON technique developed by Adam Cohen's lab.
(1/2)

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

New paper from the lab 🚨
Led by Ali Golbabaei, this study explores the how the composition of prefrontal cortical engrams changes with memory age:
authors.elsevier.com/a/1lzT-3BtfH...

Congrats Jun!!

Distinct circuit motifs evaluate opposing innate values of odors Evaluating the innate value of objects is critical for expressing adaptive behaviors. However, where and how this computation takes place in the brain…

A fascinating paper from Hokto Kazama's lab draws upon the fly connectome and large scale recordings to show how olfactory valence is encoded in distinct neurons in the lateral horn (drosophila amygdala) through labeled lines and biased feedforward inhibition www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Excited to share that I landed my dream job!🎉🎉🎉 The Pennington Lab will be opening at the University of British Columbia in January 2026!
@ubcpsych.bsky.social @dmcbrainhealth.bsky.social

Transcriptomic diversity of amygdalar subdivisions across humans and nonhuman primates Specialized cell types and links to psychiatric disorders are revealed by genetic mapping of primate amygdala neurons.

A spatially resolved transcriptomic atlas of the primate amygdala (human, macaque, and baboon) now out in Science Advances (www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...). The amygdala contains 32 types of neurons with many neuron types specific to particular subdivisions.

Lots of updates from the preprint!

Excited to share our latest paper - now out in @science.org - we showed how oxytocin modulates maternally-directed behavior in young mice (P15).

Emotion research has a communication conundrum In 2025, the words we use to describe emotions matter, but their definitions are controversial. Here, I unpack the different positions in this space and the rationales behind them—and I invite 13…

My new essay for @thetransmitter.bsky.social. Why is understanding emotion so challenging? The debates around what counts as an "emotion" shed insight.

These disputes are multidimensional, principled and fascinating. Here, I unpack them.

www.thetransmitter.org/the-big-pict...

Please RP.
We are thrilled to announce that our lab’s first preprint is out!
”Whole-genome single-cell multimodal history tracing to reveal cell identity transition”

We report HisTrac-seq, a multiomic single-cell molecular recording platform.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

The neural basis of species-specific defensive behaviour in Peromyscus mice - Nature Visual threat triggers contrasting freeze and escape defensive responses in two species of deer mice as a result of different activation thresholds downstream of the superior colliculus in the do...

Finally it's out! www.nature.com/articles/s41... How flexible are essential innate behaviours and their underlying neural circuits? @felixbaier.bsky.social & I, with Hopi Hoekstra and @farrowlab.bsky.social, addressed this by studying the #evolution of threat avoidance in Peromyscus mice.

Great, the meeting is in good hands!

Jobs We are working to solve the biggest mysteries in bioscience.

We have an open position for a Scientist I at the Allen Institute for Neural Dynamics. Come join our exciting research environment @alleninstitute.org. Please share!

alleninstitute.org/careers/jobs...