The challenges of understanding the immensely complex spatiotemporally variable neural circuitry in the normal and diseased brain

Resumen

A recent detailed analysis of how well neuroscientists understand brain function concluded that we have highly overestimated this ability. Here, we support this view but argue for important exceptions whose identification serves useful didactic purposes. For example, the highly-studied Superior Colliculus (SC), known best as involved in controlling gaze shifts, has a much more complex functional organization than originally assumed; being involved in encoding many different behaviours including cognitive functions not even requiring eye movements. An additionally important, but less understood, brain mechanism regards how sequences of different behaviors are generated rapidly, each often requiring a unique brain-wide spatiotemporal pattern of neural activity. How are different complex neural circuits selected and rapidly switched, sequentially, from one brain-wide spatiotemporal configuration to another? What experimental approaches are needed to understand major circuit complexity and how can this knowledge be applied to research on neurological diseases? Here, we consider these questions using, as examples, two brain regions: the highly studied midbrain’s SC and visual area V4, both of whom have profuse connectivity to cortical and subcortical brain regions but with the SC’s dynamic multi-functional connectivity being far better understood. We suggest that comparisons between the best understood SC and less understood V4 can guide reflections on what experimental and evolutionary-based theoretical approaches are important to understand brain-wide dynamic neural signal processing.

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Cómo citar (APA 7)

Neupane, S., & Guitton, D. (2025). The challenges of understanding the immensely complex spatiotemporally variable neural circuitry in the normal and diseased brain. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/trn2x_v1