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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · 19h

@sinaibrain.bsky.social @dctvny.bsky.social

Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · 19h

The 18th Science New Wave film festival starts this Friday! Join us for a weekend-long celebration of science and cinema, including feature and short films, documentaries, experimental films, science fiction, and projects that defy categorization.
www.labocine.com/events/scien...

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Reposted by Lauren Vetere

Zoé Christenson Wick @zoechristensonwick.bsky.social · Sep 11

🚨New preprint alert🚨
We used closed-loop optogenetics to causally test the importance of inhibitory spike timing in network function and found that manipulating PV+ cell theta phase locking in the dentate gyrus can shift seizure susceptibility (both ways!)

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Reposted by Lauren Vetere

Prof Sam Illingworth @samillingworth.com · May 20

🎉 Calling All Poets & Scientists

A science poetry competition for @unesco.org International Year of Quantum Science and Technology

📅 Deadline 20th June
🌐 Submit poems in in English, French, or Spanish
💷 Win up to £1,000 + FREE to enter

🔗 www.thebrilliantpoetry.com

#Poetry #SciComm #IYQ2025 🧪

Brilliant Poetry | Join the Verse Revolution

Explore the fusion of poetry and science. Enter the international competition celebrating quantum wonders with incredible cash prizes. Submission opens March 21, 2025.

www.thebrilliantpoetry.com

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Reposted by Lauren Vetere

A Carew @justonecarew.bsky.social · Feb 8

A great post summarizing the current situation with NIH. If NSF follows suit, the impacts on US research & universities will be debilitating.

Please call your reps—you can use Liz’s great script! (if you have anxiety like me, the weekend is a good time because you can leave a voicemail lol)

Liz Marnik @sciencewhizliz.bsky.social · Feb 8

If you appreciate science & support biomedical research then you should be aware that we all recieved devestating news from NIH today regarding indirect costs. I wrote about it below & gave you a script to call your elected representatives.

fromthescienceclass.substack.com/p/biomedical...

Biomedical Research Under Threat: Urge Congress to Act Now!

A Friday evening plea from a concerned scientist

fromthescienceclass.substack.com

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Reposted by Lauren Vetere

Tristan Shuman @tristanshuman.bsky.social · Jan 28

New paper out in Cell Reports! Led by @susieyufeng.bsky.social, we found that chronic epilepsy in mice drives distinct synchronization deficits in hippocampus and MEC, with early changes in HPC and late-onset changes in MEC that align with progressive memory impairment.
www.cell.com/cell-reports...

Screenshot of article entitled "Distinct changes to hippocampal and medial entorhinal circuits emerge across the progression of cognitive deficits in epilepsy" by Yu Feng, Keziah S. Diego, Zhe Dong, ..., Nadia N. Khan, Denise J. Cai, and Tristan Shuman.

In brief: Feng et al. demonstrate that memory deficits in temporal lobe epilepsy involve multiple discrete mechanisms with distinct time courses. In epileptic mice, early-onset memory deficits are associated with disrupted hippocampal synchronization, while more severe, lateonset impairments are associated with disrupted synchrony of medial entorhinal cortex circuits.

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 22

A huge THANK YOU to my mentor @tristanshuman.bsky.social & all co-authors/collaborators/mentors/supporters who made this work possible! (6/6)

🙏 Angie Galas, Nick Vaughan, Susie Feng, @zoechristensonwick.bsky.social, Paul Philipsberg, Olga Liobimova, Antonio Fernandez-Ruiz, @denisejcai.bsky.social

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 22

Overall, these findings highlight disrupted timing & coordination in this circuitry, suggesting impaired MEC-hippocampus communication.

Moving forward, we’re excited to explore if restoring theta synchrony and/or spike timing in these circuits can ameliorate memory deficits. (5/6)

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 22

We also found disruptions in neuronal firing patterns, including:

⬇️ theta phase locking in MEC3 excitatory neurons

⬆️ firing rates in MEC2 excitatory neurons (in line with past work showing hyperexcitability in vitro)

Check out the preprint for more on other regions and celltypes! (4/6)

The top row shows a schematic of theta phase locking of MEC excitatory cells. A silicon probe is shown spanning across MEC2 and 3, which include multiple cell types. Spikes are shown below a schematized theta oscillation, recurring at a consistent phase of theta. In the left (blue) and middle (pink) column indicating WT and 6-month-old 3xTg mice, this phase locking pattern is present. However, in the right column (purple, corresponding to 8-month-old 3xTg mice), this pattern is disrupted.
In the bottom row, one bar graph shows reduced phase locking strength (or R values) of MEC3 excitatory neurons in 8-month-old 3xTg mice compared to their wildtype controls and to 6-month-old 3xTg mice. A second bar graph shows increased MEC2 firing rates in 8-month-old 3xTg mice compared to their wildtype controls.

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 22

Theta oscillations are important for memory, plasticity, & long-range communication.

In 3xTg mice, we found ⬇️ hippocampal theta power and ⬇️ theta synchrony between MEC & CA1.

These changes emerged specifically at our later timepoint, coinciding with spatial memory deficits! (3/6)

A graphical abstract showing some of the paper’s main findings. The left column (blue) shows the measure being assessed, while the middle column (pink) summarizes findings in 6-month-old 3xTg mice compared to wildtype, and the right column (in purple) summarizes findings in 8-month-old 3xTg mice compared to wildtype. The top row summarizes our finding that spatial memory impairments occurred in 8-month-old 3xTg mice in a novel object location task. The middle row summarizes the finding that hippocampal theta power was reduced in 8-month-old 3xTg mice, with oscillations that decrease in amplitude shown for visualization. The bottom row shows that synchrony, or coherence theta oscillations between MEC and CA1 was reduced in 8-month-old 3xTg mice. A schematic of a pair of oscillations that have a consistent phase relationship are shown in the first two columns, in blue while the pair of oscillations in the final column (shown in purple) do not have a consistent phase relationship.

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 22

We used silicon probes to record from MEC (layer 2 + 3) & hippocampus (CA1 + DG) simultaneously in the 3xTg mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease pathology.

This let us capture oscillations & single units in both hippocampus & MEC (a major source of hippocampal inputs). (2/6)

An image of a mouse headfixed on a spherical treadmill while it runs through a virtual reality track. Next, a schematic of a mouse showing locations of two silicon probes with four shanks each. One probe is in dorsal hippocampus and the other is in medial entorhinal cortex. On the bottom there are histology images showing locations of one silicon probe shank in hippocampus and one in MEC. Next to each image is 1 second of example physiology data from each layer in Hippocampus or MEC.

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 22

Interested in how neural communication breaks down in a model of Alzheimer's pathology?

In a new preprint, we found desynchronization in medial entorhinal–hippocampal circuits that coincided with the onset of spatial memory deficits in 3xTg mice. (1/6)

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

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Reposted by Lauren Vetere

Sarah McAnulty, Ph.D. @sarahmackattack.bsky.social · Jan 14

I am extremely excited to announce that for the first time ever, Skype a Scientist is offering mini-grants to support IRL science communication!!

Communicating science out in our communities is critical. We want to enable others to get their projects off the ground!

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

SCIENCE IRL: Community SciComm mini-grant

Skype a Scientist is offering $300-1,000 mini-grants to support boots-on-the-ground science communication. The Science IRL mini-grants will support projects that put either 1) important science messa...

docs.google.com

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Reposted by Lauren Vetere

James Hyman @jamesmhyman.bsky.social · Jan 10

Interested in Alzheimer's research and want understand how it affects brain activity? Check this out.

We're really excited to share this brand new review article from our lab, lead by Kirsten Calvin (her first first author pub).

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

Electrophysiological insights into Alzheimer's disease: A review of human and animal studies

This review highlights the crucial role of neuroelectrophysiology in illuminating the mechanisms underlying Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathogenesis and …

www.sciencedirect.com

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 7

2025 promises to be a year of new adventures and opportunities, so I’m excited to see what comes next! (6/6)

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 7

On a personal note, I attended the beautiful weddings of multiple dear friends. Did I cry BEFORE the ceremonies started? You had to be there to know! (5/6)

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 7

I returned to Symbiosis, the science short film contest I competed in in 2023, this time as the coordinator! It was an honor to work with Imagine Science Films/Labocine/ @simonsfoundation.org to support this year's 6 INCREDIBLE scientist-artist pairs in their filmmaking journeys. (4/6)

Lauren stands on stage holding a microphone, with artistic images of a laboratory on the screen behind her.

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 7

Other notable 2024 happenings: I told my first live science story with @storycollider.bsky.social! (3/6)

Lauren stands on stage behind a microphone, talking with her hands.

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 7

A HUGE thanks to my PI @tristanshuman.bsky.social, my committee (@melcregor.bsky.social, @denisejcai.bsky.social, @erinlrich.bsky.social, Ana Pereira, Annabelle Singer), everyone in the Shuman & Cai labs, + all my mentors at UF & @sinaibrain.bsky.social
for your wisdom, generosity, & support! (2/6)

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Jan 7

Did 2024 feel LONG to anyone else? A little 2024 recap from me: I defended my PhD and submitted a first author paper describing my thesis work! Look out for a preprint very soon. (1/6)

Lauren stands in front of a screen showing the first slide of her thesis defense, titled "Entorhinal-hippocampal desynchronization in a mouse model of Alzheimer's Disease Pathology."

Lauren's PI Tristan Shuman places a celebratory flower crown on her head while she makes a comically huge grin.

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Lauren Vetere @laurenmvetere.bsky.social · Nov 23

I have seen someone say skyprints. I feel like there is a potential pun with sky writing to be had on this platform but I haven't figured out what it is yet.

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Reposted by Lauren Vetere

Zach Pennington @zachtpennington.bsky.social · Nov 22

SO EXCITED to share our latest work demonstrating that the anterior hypothalamic nucleus (AHN) regulates stress vulnerability!!!

Denise J. Cai, Ph.D. @denisejcai.bsky.social · Nov 22

❓ Do you know what the anterior hypothalamic nucleus (AHN) does? No? Neither did we! 🧠

In a new preprint from the Cai Lab, learn how we discovered the AHN’s central role in regulating stress vulnerability.

Read the paper here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... (1/6)

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Reposted by Lauren Vetere

The Story Collider @storycollider.bsky.social · Nov 15

We're officially on BlueSky 🚀 If you don't know us, we share stories that spark curiosity, inspire, & connect science with human experiences. 🔬✨ Follow us for incredible tales and updates about what we do around the world! And if you got a science story to share – hit us up!
#Storytelling #Science

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Reposted by Lauren Vetere

Denise J. Cai, Ph.D. @denisejcai.bsky.social · Nov 19

🌟 Cai Lab Nature (@natureportfolio.bsky.social) paper alert! In work led by Joe Zaki, we find that rest periods after learning not only stabilize new memories BUT ALSO integrate new memories with older ones from days past! (1/10)

Read it here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Nature paper article with title and abstract

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