Journal
NATURE NEUROSCIENCE
Volume 16, Issue 11, Pages 1687-1691Publisher
NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
DOI: 10.1038/nn.3519
Keywords
-
Categories
Funding
- National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders [R01DC009640, R21DC010911]
- Whitehall Foundation
- Brain Research Foundation
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Glomeruli are functional units in the olfactory system. The mouse olfactory bulb contains roughly 2,000 glomeruli, each receiving inputs from olfactory sensory neurons (OSNs) that express a specific odorant receptor gene. Odors typically activate many glomeruli in complex combinatorial patterns and it is unknown which features of neuronal activity in individual glomeruli contribute to odor perception. To address this, we used optogenetics to selectively activate single, genetically identified glomeruli in behaving mice. We found that mice could perceive the stimulation of a single glomerulus. Single-glomerulus stimulation was also detected on an intense odor background. In addition, different input intensities and the timing of input relative to sniffing were discriminated through one glomerulus. Our data suggest that each glomerulus can transmit odor information using identity, intensity and temporal coding cues. These multiple modes of information transmission may enable the olfactory system to efficiently identify and localize odor sources.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available