Imaging system developed by Chinese scientists maps brain activity in free moving zebrafish
Technology that links neural activity and behaviour could shed light on motion-related diseases such as Parkinson’s
Chinese scientists have recorded a visual representation of a fish thinking about its dinner in a rare glimpse inside the brain of a free moving animal.
When its prey came into sight, a group of neurons in the forebrain of the larval zebra fish started to glow in video footage captured by the researchers with a special underwater camera.
The fish had been genetically modified so its neurons would emit fluorescent light when they fired. That light could be seen under the illumination of blue laser beams.
As the zebra fish approached its prey, a single-cell organism known as a paramecium, the middle and hind areas of the brain lit up one after another.
“It took the fish three attempts to catch and eat the paramecium,” the researchers wrote in a paper published last month in the peer-reviewed journal eLife.