Sensorimotor Transformations in the Zebrafish Auditory System

ROMANO, SEBASTIÁN A.; BOULANGER-WEILL, JONATHAN; SOARES, DAPHNE; PRIVAT, MARTIN; JOUARY, ADRIEN; DUCHEMIN, AURIANE; PIETRI, THOMAS; ELBAZ, NICOLAS; SUMBRE, GERMÁN

CURRENT BIOLOGY

CELL PRESS

Año: 2019

0960-9822

Organisms use their sensory systems to acquire in- formation from their environment and integrate this information to produce relevant behaviors. Neverthe- less, how sensory information is converted into adequate motor patterns in the brain remains an open question. Here, we addressed this question using two-photon and light-sheet calcium imaging in intact, behaving zebrafish larvae. We monitored neural activity elicited by auditory stimuli while simul- taneously recording tail movements. We observed a spatial organization of neural activity according to four different response profiles (frequency tuning curves), suggesting a low-dimensional representa- tion of frequency information, maintained throughout the development of the larvae. Low frequencies (150? 450 Hz) were locally processed in the hindbrain and elicited motor behaviors. In contrast, higher fre- quencies (900?1,000 Hz) rarely induced motor behav- iors and were also represented in the midbrain. Finally, we found that the sensorimotor transforma- tions in the zebrafish auditory system are a contin- uous and gradual process that involves the temporal integration of the sensory response in order to generate a motor behavior.