I am very happy to share that the latest work from the lab, led by Dr. Qi Xue, has been published in PNAS and is now online: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

So grateful for this even if the reward prediction error had almost gone extinct (look at my happysad face). Thank you John and everyone who supported my proposal, Nino Ramirez, @bingbrunton.bsky.social, @darbly.bsky.social, Rui Chang, and the NIH reviewers and program officers!

🧵 New preprint led by @bingbrunton.bsky.social, @elliottabe.bsky.social, @lawrencehu.bsky.social We gave a worm brain control of a fly body and it walked What did we learn? Nothing, other than deep reinforcement learning is effective We call it the digital sphinx www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Sometimes failed experiments reveal gaps in how we are thinking about a problem, and digging into why an experiment didn't work can lead to discovery. This new preprint by Anne Sustar, in collaboration with Dion Dickman's lab, is one of those gratifying instances.🧵 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

I am thrilled to be able to work with @kemarshall.bsky.social (Canada), Sebastian Brauchi (Chile), and Xubiao Peng (China) to understand biophysical mechanisms of neuromuscular function in the cold. Science transcends borders. I love that HFSP makes that a requirement for these grants. 🌍

Serious question… is this is a real fly? A startup thinks it's a "real uploaded animal". What do you think? for @theverge.com with @shahabbakht.bsky.social @asbates.bsky.social @anayebi.bsky.social @birchlse.bsky.social @tom-mcclelland.bsky.social www.theverge.com/ai-artificia...

This is the most incredible footage of blue whales I’ve ever seen

How does the brain control locomotion? In our new preprint, we uncover a brain circuit in Drosophila that controls forward walking independently of turning. This dedicated locomotor circuit enables flexible motor control and might reflect a shared principle across species. doi.org/10.64898/202...

0.00003 foot tall xmas tree from a Drosophila flight steering muscle 🎄 image by @anne-sustar.bsky.social

How do animals channel sensory information into motor pathways to generate flexible behavioral output? Excited to share a new preprint addressing this question by leveraging the new #maleCNS connectome, behavioral experiments, and in-vivo recordings: doi.org/10.64898/202.... A long🧵...

(1/3)Excited to share PKU tags—our lab’s latest contribution expanding the toolkit for cell-type labeling with a new shape dimension! Developed at PKU, these genetically encoded tools enable multiplex cell-type labeling compatible with both light and electron microscopy.

How do neural circuits generate the walking rhythm? Using connectome simulations, @sarahpugly.bsky.social found a minimal central pattern generator (CPG) that produces oscillations in leg motor neurons. Same circuit motif for each 🪰 leg. w @bingbrunton.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Excited to share my most recent postdoctoral work in the Jeanne lab @yaleneuro.bsky.social ! “Sensory processing reformats odor coding around valence and dynamics” www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... We ask: how is a sensory code transformed across multiple stages of processing to inform behavior?

🚀 New paper alert! Thrilled to share our latest study led by postdoc @gera_jayati published in eLife. 👉 doi.org/10.7554/eLif... Continue reading for a summary. 🧵

My thesis work is out! 🪰 We often link pain to mammals—sometimes exclusively humans—but what about flies? Thanks to @tuthill.bsky.social for supporting a funky, fun project, and to @NIH & @hhmi.org for funding over the past half decade!

Do flies feel pain? Spooky new preprint from our lab on the cells and circuits that mediate nociceptive behaviors in adult Drosophila, led by graduate student (and newly minted PhD!) @jonesjes.bsky.social. 🪰⚡👻🎃 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

🪰 folks! I spoke to the Transmitter about FlyBase. As noted at flybase.org, bridge $ ran out and many staff were laid off. Good news is stopgap contributions will keep core FlyBase operations active. But community support remains essential. Please donate @FlyBase and share! 1/2 tinyurl.com/FlyBase

Finally, someone has solved a real problem with AI! No more having to take a paper in the format for a journal that rejected you, and reformat it for a new journal. Well done!! formatmypaper.com

Excited to share our new #biorxivpreprint: “Sexual dimorphism in the complete connectome of the Drosophila male central nervous system” www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... We describe the #connectomics reconstruction and analysis of an entire adult #maleCNS #drosophila central nervous system. 1/10

Now out in @nature.com: Our study discovering a neural circuit in Drosophila that predictively inhibits proprioceptor axons during voluntary leg movements, such as walking and grooming. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

congratulations to our own Juan Ispizua on being selected as a pew latin american postdoctoral fellow www.pew.org/en/projects/...

News via The Transmitter www.thetransmitter.org/community/ha...

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...

Public access to the first fly connectome that spans the whole CNS - BANC!: codex.flywire.ai?dataset=banc Different from prior connectomes - it is brain + cord (think spinal cord) We use it to ‘embody’ the system and find it resembles ‘subsumption architecture’ doi.org/10.1101/2025...

How is the nervous system organized to coordinate behavior? To approach this massive question, a team led by @asbates.bsky.social, @jasper-tms.bsky.social, @mindyisminsu.bsky.social, & Helen Yang present the BANC: a Brain and Nerve Cord connectome. Preprint: doi.org/10.1101/2025... 🧪#Neuroskyence

Graduate student @kylethieringer.com and I wrote a dispatch about a new @currentbiology.bsky.social paper (doi.org/10.1016/j.cu...) describing a proprioceptive neural circuit that helps the fly visual system identify (and ignore) its own legs. authors.elsevier.com/a/1lYLj3QW8S...

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...

Happy 6-yr anniversary, Carlson lab! 🥹 It has been the best 6 years of my scientific career and I’m going to miss them so dearly when I leave 😭 The best career advice I can give to the young scientists: find a mentor, mentees, and lab that you love. It makes science so much more worth it.

This may be the darkest of times, but I won’t let it stop me from celebrating this little moment: I received the keys to my new lab @ucdavis.bsky.social today ☺️ #ScienceMustGoOn 🧬🧪🦟

Happy to announce that our paper examining the function of leg mechanosensory neurons by way of their connectivity is finally officially published! rdcu.be/ekqVt