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Peer-reviewedCC BY 4.0eLife

Organization of circuits linking descending input to motor output in the Drosophila Male Adult Nerve Cord connectome

  • Han SJ Cheong1,2
  • Katharina Eichler3
  • Tomke Stürner3,4
  • Samuel K Asinof1
  • Andrew S Champion3,4
  • Elizabeth C Marin3
  • Tess B Oram1
  • Marissa Sumathipala1
  • Lalanti Venkatasubramanian3,4
  • Shigehiro Namiki5
  • Igor Siwanowicz1
  • Marta Costa3
4 more authors
  • Stuart Berg1
  • Janelia FlyEM Project Team1
  • Gregory SXE Jefferis3,4
  • Gwyneth M Card1,2
5 affiliations
  1. 1Janelia Research Campus, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Ashburn, United States
  2. 2Zuckerman Institute, Columbia University, New York, United States
  3. 3Drosophila Connectomics Group, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom
  4. 4Neurobiology Division, MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge, United Kingdom
  5. 5Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
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Abstract

In most animals, a small number of descending neurons (DNs) connect the brain to circuits and motor neurons (MNs) in the nerve cord. To understand how brain signals generate behavior, it is critical to understand the organization of the neural pathways linking DNs to MNs. In companion papers, we introduced a densely reconstructed connectome of the Drosophila Male Adult Nerve Cord (MANC; Takemura et al., 2024), including cell types and developmental lineages (Marin et al., 2024), which provides complete connectivity of the ventral nerve cord (VNC) at synaptic resolution. Here, we present a first look at the organization of the networks connecting DNs to MNs. We first proofread and curated all DNs and MNs, then systematically matched their morphology to light microscopy data. We report both broad organizational patterns of the entire network and fine-scale analysis of selected circuits of interest. We discover that direct DN-MN connections are infrequent and identify neuron communities putatively linked to control of different motor systems, including walking, flight steering and power generation, and coordinated action of wings and legs. Our analyses generate hypotheses for future functional experiments and empowers others to investigate these and other circuits of the VNC in richer mechanistic detail.

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Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@article{cheong2026organization,
  title = {{Organization of circuits linking descending input to motor output in the Drosophila Male Adult Nerve Cord connectome}},
  author = {Han SJ Cheong and Katharina Eichler and Tomke Stürner and Samuel K Asinof and Andrew S Champion and Elizabeth C Marin and Tess B Oram and Marissa Sumathipala and Lalanti Venkatasubramanian and Shigehiro Namiki and Igor Siwanowicz and Marta Costa and Stuart Berg and Janelia FlyEM Project Team and Gregory SXE Jefferis and Gwyneth M Card},
  journal = {eLife},
  year = {2026},
  month = jul,
  doi = {10.7554/elife.96084},
  url = {https://elifesciences.org/articles/96084},
  note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY  - JOUR
TI  - Organization of circuits linking descending input to motor output in the Drosophila Male Adult Nerve Cord connectome
AU  - Han SJ Cheong
AU  - Katharina Eichler
AU  - Tomke Stürner
AU  - Samuel K Asinof
AU  - Andrew S Champion
AU  - Elizabeth C Marin
AU  - Tess B Oram
AU  - Marissa Sumathipala
AU  - Lalanti Venkatasubramanian
AU  - Shigehiro Namiki
AU  - Igor Siwanowicz
AU  - Marta Costa
AU  - Stuart Berg
AU  - Janelia FlyEM Project Team
AU  - Gregory SXE Jefferis
AU  - Gwyneth M Card
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/07/20
JO  - eLife
DO  - 10.7554/elife.96084
UR  - https://elifesciences.org/articles/96084
AB  - In most animals, a small number of descending neurons (DNs) connect the brain to circuits and motor neurons (MNs) in the nerve cord. To understand how brain signals generate behavior, it is critical to understand the organization of the neural pathways linking DNs to MNs. In companion papers, we introduced a densely reconstructed connectome of the Drosophila Male Adult Nerve Cord (MANC; Takemura et al., 2024), including cell types and developmental lineages (Marin et al., 2024), which provides complete connectivity of the ventral nerve cord (VNC) at synaptic resolution. Here, we present a first look at the organization of the networks connecting DNs to MNs. We first proofread and curated all DNs and MNs, then systematically matched their morphology to light microscopy data. We report both broad organizational patterns of the entire network and fine-scale analysis of selected circuits of interest. We discover that direct DN-MN connections are infrequent and identify neuron communities putatively linked to control of different motor systems, including walking, flight steering and power generation, and coordinated action of wings and legs. Our analyses generate hypotheses for future functional experiments and empowers others to investigate these and other circuits of the VNC in richer mechanistic detail.
SN  - 2050-084X
ER  -