Skip to content
DraconiticResearch
Search Sources API
197,785 studies31 sourcesUpdated 52 min ago
Peer-reviewedCC BYNature

Distributed control circuits across a brain-and-cord connectome

  • Alexander Shakeel Bates1,2,3,4
  • Jasper S. Phelps5,6,4,7
  • Minsu Kim8,9,4
  • Helen H. Yang4
  • Arie Matsliah10
  • Zaki Ajabi4
  • Eric Perlman11,12
  • Kevin M. Delgado4
  • Mohammed Abdal Monium Osman4
  • Christopher K. Salmon10
  • Jay Gager10
  • Benjamin Silverman10
88 more authors
  • Sophia Renauld4
  • Farzaan Salman13,4
  • Janki Patel4
  • Matthew F. Collie4
  • Jingxuan Fan4
  • Diego A. Pacheco4
  • Yunzhi Zhao4
  • Wenyi Zhang4,14
  • Laia Serratosa Capdevila15,14
  • Ruairí J.V. Roberts15,14
  • Eva J Munnelly15,14
  • Nina Griggs15,14
  • Helen Langley15,14
  • Borja Moya‐Llamas15,8,16
  • Zuoyu Zhang17,18,10
  • Ryan T. Maloney8,19,16,10
  • Szi-chieh Yu10
  • Amy Robinson Sterling10,20
  • Marissa Sorek10,20
  • Krzysztof Kruk20,10
  • Nikitas Serafetinidis20,21
  • Serene Dhawan10,22
  • Finja Klemm22,23
  • Paul S Brooks23,24
  • Ellen Lesser24,25
  • Jessica M. Jones25
  • Sara E. Pierce-Lundgren25
  • Su-Yee J. Lee25
  • Yichen Luo25,13
  • Andrew P. Cook26,27
  • Theresa H. McKim27,28
  • Dimitrios Stasi Giakoumas29,30,31
  • Benjamin Gorko32,33
  • Justin Ellis-Joyce34,35,10
  • Jiayi Zhang36,10
  • Emily C. Kophs28,10
  • Tjalda Falt31,10
  • Alexa M. Negron-Morales33,37
  • A Burke10,37
  • James Hebditch10,37
  • Kyle Patrick Willie10,37
  • Ryan Willie10,37
  • Sergiy Popovych38,37
  • Nico Kemnitz38,37
  • Dodam Ih38,39
  • Kisuk Lee38,40
  • Ran Lu38
  • Akhilesh Halageri38,10

60 listed; 100 in total.

40 affiliations
  1. 1Centre for Neural Circuit and Behaviour, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK. [email protected]
  2. 2Department of Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA. [email protected]
  3. 3Centre for Neural Circuit and Behaviour, Universityof Oxford, Oxford, UK
  4. 4Department of Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
  5. 5Department of Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA. [email protected]
  6. 6Neuroengineering Laboratory, Brain Mind Institute and Institute of Bioengineering, EPFL, Lausanne, Switzerland. [email protected]
  7. 7Neuroengineering Laboratory, Brain Mind Institute and Institute of Bioengineering, EPFL, Lausanne, Switzerland
  8. 8Center for Brain Science, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
  9. 9Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
  10. 10Princeton Neuroscience Institute, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA
  11. 11Yikes, Baltimore, MD, USA
  12. 12Yikes LLC, Baltimore, MD, USA
  13. 13Department of Biology, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, USA
  14. 14Aelysia LTD, Bristol, UK
  15. 15Aelysia, Bristol, UK
  16. 16Psychology Department, Colorado College, Colorado Springs, CO, USA
  17. 17Beijing Institute for Brain Research, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China
  18. 18Chinese Institute for Brain Research, Beijing, Beijing, China
  19. 19Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
  20. 20Eyewire, Boston, MA, USA
  21. 21Neurobiology Division, MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge, UK
  22. 22Genetics Department, Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany
  23. 23Zoology Department, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
  24. 24Department of Molecular Genetics and Cell Biology, The University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
  25. 25Department of Neurobiology and Biophysics, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
  26. 26School of Neuroscience, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
  27. 27Department of Biology, University of Nevada Reno, Reno, NV, USA
  28. 28Department of Biological Sciences, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
  29. 29Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA
  30. 30Interdisciplinary Graduate Program in Neuroscience, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA
  31. 31Max Planck Institute for Biological Intelligence, Martinsried, Germany
  32. 32Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA
  33. 33Institute of Neurobiology, University of Puerto Rico Medical Sciences Campus, San Juan, Puerto Rico
  34. 34Department of Neuroscience, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA
  35. 35HHMI Janelia, Ashburn, VA, USA
  36. 36Institute of Neuroscience, Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China
  37. 37Zetta AI LLC, Sherrill, NY, USA
  38. 38Zetta AI, Sherrill, NY, USA
  39. 39School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
  40. 40Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology(JAIST), Nomi, Japan
Open at sourceDOICite

Abstract

Just as genomes revolutionized molecular genetics, connectomes (maps of neurons and synapses) are transforming neuroscience. To date, the only organisms with complete connectomes are worms 1–3 , sea squirts 4 and comb jellies 5 (10 3 –10 4 synapses). By contrast, the fruit fly is more complex (10 8 synaptic connections), with a brain that supports learning and spatial memory 6,7 and an intricate ventral nerve cord analogous to the vertebrate spinal cord 8–12 . Here we report a densely reconstructed adult fly connectome that unites the brain and ventral nerve cord, and we leverage this resource to investigate principles of neural control. We show that effector neurons (motor neurons, endocrine cells and efferent neurons targeting the viscera) are primarily influenced by sensory neurons in the same body part, forming local feedback loops. These local loops are linked by long-range circuits that involve ascending and descending neurons organized into behaviour-centric modules. Single ascending and descending neurons are often positioned to influence the voluntary movements of multiple body parts, together with the endocrine cells or visceral organs that support those movements. Brain regions involved in learning and navigation supervise these circuits. These results reveal an architecture that is distributed, parallelized and embodied, reminiscent of distributed control architectures in engineered systems 13,14 .

Related

  1. Connectome modulates critical brain dynamics across local and global scales
    Giovanni Rabuffo, Pietro Bozzo, Bach Nguyen +6
    Physical Review ResearchPeer-reviewedPublisher termsNeuroscienceCrossref
  2. Brain age prediction from structural and functional connectivity across the lifespan using connectome-based predictive modeling
    M. C. McCusker, J. Dadashkarimi, H. Sun +2
    bioRxivPreprintCC BYFull textNeurosciencebioRxiv
  3. Organization of circuits linking descending input to motor output in the Drosophila Male Adult Nerve Cord connectome
    Han SJ Cheong, Katharina Eichler, Tomke Stürner +13
    eLifePeer-reviewedCC BY 4.0Full text54 citedNeuroscienceeLife
  4. Strategy-Dependent Recruitment of Distributed Cortical Circuits during Spatial Navigation
    Daniel A. Surinach, Mathew L. Rynes, Kapil Saxena +4
    The Journal of NeurosciencePeer-reviewedPublisher termsFull text8 citedNeurosciencePMCOpenAlex
  5. Connectome analysis reveals brain-wide visual processing in Drosophila
    Sung Yong Kim, Anmo J. Kim
    iSciencePeer-reviewedCC BY-NC 4.0NeuroscienceCrossrefCell Press

Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@article{bates2026distributed,
  title = {{Distributed control circuits across a brain-and-cord connectome}},
  author = {Alexander Shakeel Bates and Jasper S. Phelps and Minsu Kim and Helen H. Yang and Arie Matsliah and Zaki Ajabi and Eric Perlman and Kevin M. Delgado and Mohammed Abdal Monium Osman and Christopher K. Salmon and Jay Gager and Benjamin Silverman and Sophia Renauld and Farzaan Salman and Janki Patel and Matthew F. Collie and Jingxuan Fan and Diego A. Pacheco and Yunzhi Zhao and Wenyi Zhang and Laia Serratosa Capdevila and Ruairí J.V. Roberts and Eva J Munnelly and Nina Griggs and Helen Langley and Borja Moya‐Llamas and Zuoyu Zhang and Ryan T. Maloney and Szi-chieh Yu and Amy Robinson Sterling and Marissa Sorek and Krzysztof Kruk and Nikitas Serafetinidis and Serene Dhawan and Finja Klemm and Paul S Brooks and Ellen Lesser and Jessica M. Jones and Sara E. Pierce-Lundgren and Su-Yee J. Lee and Yichen Luo and Andrew P. Cook and Theresa H. McKim and Dimitrios Stasi Giakoumas and Benjamin Gorko and Justin Ellis-Joyce and Jiayi Zhang and Emily C. Kophs and Tjalda Falt and Alexa M. Negron-Morales and A Burke and James Hebditch and Kyle Patrick Willie and Ryan Willie and Sergiy Popovych and Nico Kemnitz and Dodam Ih and Kisuk Lee and Ran Lu and Akhilesh Halageri},
  journal = {Nature},
  year = {2026},
  month = jun,
  doi = {10.1038/s41586-026-10735-w},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10735-w},
  note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY  - JOUR
TI  - Distributed control circuits across a brain-and-cord connectome
AU  - Alexander Shakeel Bates
AU  - Jasper S. Phelps
AU  - Minsu Kim
AU  - Helen H. Yang
AU  - Arie Matsliah
AU  - Zaki Ajabi
AU  - Eric Perlman
AU  - Kevin M. Delgado
AU  - Mohammed Abdal Monium Osman
AU  - Christopher K. Salmon
AU  - Jay Gager
AU  - Benjamin Silverman
AU  - Sophia Renauld
AU  - Farzaan Salman
AU  - Janki Patel
AU  - Matthew F. Collie
AU  - Jingxuan Fan
AU  - Diego A. Pacheco
AU  - Yunzhi Zhao
AU  - Wenyi Zhang
AU  - Laia Serratosa Capdevila
AU  - Ruairí J.V. Roberts
AU  - Eva J Munnelly
AU  - Nina Griggs
AU  - Helen Langley
AU  - Borja Moya‐Llamas
AU  - Zuoyu Zhang
AU  - Ryan T. Maloney
AU  - Szi-chieh Yu
AU  - Amy Robinson Sterling
AU  - Marissa Sorek
AU  - Krzysztof Kruk
AU  - Nikitas Serafetinidis
AU  - Serene Dhawan
AU  - Finja Klemm
AU  - Paul S Brooks
AU  - Ellen Lesser
AU  - Jessica M. Jones
AU  - Sara E. Pierce-Lundgren
AU  - Su-Yee J. Lee
AU  - Yichen Luo
AU  - Andrew P. Cook
AU  - Theresa H. McKim
AU  - Dimitrios Stasi Giakoumas
AU  - Benjamin Gorko
AU  - Justin Ellis-Joyce
AU  - Jiayi Zhang
AU  - Emily C. Kophs
AU  - Tjalda Falt
AU  - Alexa M. Negron-Morales
AU  - A Burke
AU  - James Hebditch
AU  - Kyle Patrick Willie
AU  - Ryan Willie
AU  - Sergiy Popovych
AU  - Nico Kemnitz
AU  - Dodam Ih
AU  - Kisuk Lee
AU  - Ran Lu
AU  - Akhilesh Halageri
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/06/08
JO  - Nature
DO  - 10.1038/s41586-026-10735-w
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10735-w
AB  - Just as genomes revolutionized molecular genetics, connectomes (maps of neurons and synapses) are transforming neuroscience. To date, the only organisms with complete connectomes are worms 1–3 , sea squirts 4 and comb jellies 5 (10 3 –10 4 synapses). By contrast, the fruit fly is more complex (10 8 synaptic connections), with a brain that supports learning and spatial memory 6,7 and an intricate ventral nerve cord analogous to the vertebrate spinal cord 8–12 . Here we report a densely reconstructed adult fly connectome that unites the brain and ventral nerve cord, and we leverage this resource to investigate principles of neural control. We show that effector neurons (motor neurons, endocrine cells and efferent neurons targeting the viscera) are primarily influenced by sensory neurons in the same body part, forming local feedback loops. These local loops are linked by long-range circuits that involve ascending and descending neurons organized into behaviour-centric modules. Single ascending and descending neurons are often positioned to influence the voluntary movements of multiple body parts, together with the endocrine cells or visceral organs that support those movements. Brain regions involved in learning and navigation supervise these circuits. These results reveal an architecture that is distributed, parallelized and embodied, reminiscent of distributed control architectures in engineered systems 13,14 .
SN  - 0028-0836
SN  - 1476-4687
ER  -