Collaborative Research: NCS-FR: Shedding light on brain circuits mediating navigation of the odor plume in a natural environment

动物有一种敏锐的能力，可以通过嗅觉找到食物、伴侣、幼崽和捕食者等气味来源，这是机器无法复制的。大脑如何通过嗅觉调节环境导航（气味羽状物）是一个重要的未解决问题。事实上，在很多情况下，使用机器来导航气味景观是一个未满足的社会需求。例如，尽管它们的训练需要与训练师进行长时间的一对一互动，但狗仍然被用来在机场和战场上寻找爆炸物。我们的多学科气味羽神经光子学（OPeN）团队将解决理解大脑回路介导气味羽导航。这是一项艰巨的任务，因为它涉及表征气味如何在空气中扩散（环境工程），开发先进的微型显微镜来记录自由运动动物的大脑（电气和机械工程），记录实时处理气味羽流信息的大脑区域（系统神经科学和综合神经光子学），并开发数学程序来量化成功的气味羽流导航所需的信息如何在大脑中表示（应用数学）。我们的团队将设计一种新型微型显微镜来记录老鼠在气味羽流中导航的活动，并评估这些神经元的活动是如何导致成功的气味羽流导航的。此外，OPeN的团队成员完全致力于促进女性、弱势群体、退伍军人和残疾人在科学领域的发展，并参与各种促进科学多样性的项目。此外，团队成员在传播他们的工作方面有着良好的记录，并与当地一家小型企业智能成像创新公司建立了合作伙伴关系，该公司的全球总部位于丹佛。我们将继续为本项目开发的技术进行商业推广。最后，我们将努力通过科学美国人、公共广播服务和丹佛自然与科学博物馆等场所向更广泛的受众传播科学。OPeN跨学科团队的成员开发了一种新型的双光子光纤耦合显微镜，用于自由移动的小鼠大脑活动的3D成像，并在实验室中生成和量化现实气味环境，以探索用于气味引导导航的算法。在这个项目中，我们利用团队广泛的专业知识和成就来破解气味羽流导航的电路基础。我们将开发一种低重量的微型3光子光纤耦合显微镜（3P-FCM），在两个视场面上同时记录一个大脑区域的神经元活动。此外，OPeN将开发一种便携式光电离（PID）传感器，用于在动物导航气味羽流时检测鼻孔中的气味浓度。OPeN团队的成员将记录动物在气味羽流导航过程中海马和小脑的神经活动，并将开发一种贝叶斯分析方法，从神经活动中解码气味羽流导航。这种多学科的方法将导致对气味羽导航的大脑机制的理解。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Animals have a keen ability to find odor sources such as food, partners, pups and predators through the sense of smell in a manner that cannot be replicated by machines. How brains mediate navigation of the environment (the odor plume) through smell is an important unsolved problem. Indeed there are many instances where using machines to navigate an odor landscape is an unmet need to society. For example, even though their training requires lengthy one on one interaction with a trainer, dogs are still used to find explosives in airports and in the battlefield. Our multidisciplinary Odor Plume Neurophotonics (OPeN) team will tackle understanding the brain circuits mediating odor plume navigation. This is a daunting task because it involves characterizing how odors diffuse in the air (environmental engineering), developing advanced miniature microscopes to record from the brain of freely moving animals (electrical and mechanical engineering), recording from brain regions processing odor plume information in real time (systems neuroscience and integrative neurophotonics), and developing mathematical procedures to quantify how the information necessary for successful odor plume navigation is represented in the brain (applied mathematics). Our team will engineer a novel miniature microscope to record activity as mice navigate the odor plume and will assess how the activity of these neurons result in successful odor plume navigation. Furthermore, the team members of OPeN are thoroughly committed to foster advancement of women, underrepresented minorities, veterans and disabled individuals in science and participate in various programs to promote science diversity. Additionally, the team members have a track record of disseminating their work and have an established partnership with a local small business, Intelligent Imaging Innovation, Inc. with world headquarters located in Denver. We will continue our commercial dissemination efforts of the technology developed in this project. Finally, we will endeavor to communicate science to the broader audience through venues such as Scientific American, Public Broadcasting Service and outreach through the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.Members of our OPeN interdisciplinary team developed a novel two photon fiber-coupled microscope for 3D imaging of brain activity in the freely moving mouse and generated and quantified realistic odor environments in the laboratory to explore algorithms used for odor-guided navigation. In this project we leverage the extensive expertise and achievements of the team to crack the circuit basis for odor plume navigation. We will develop a low-weight, miniature 3-photon fiber coupled microscope (3P-FCM) to record neuronal activity simultaneously in one brain area in two planes of view. In addition, OPeN will develop a portable photoionization (PID) sensor to detect the odorant concentration at the nostril as the animal navigates the odor plume. Members of the OPeN team will record neural activity in the hippocampus and cerebellum of animals navigating the odor plume and will develop a Bayesian analysis method to decode odor plume navigation from neural activity. This multidisciplinary approach will result in understanding of the brain mechanisms of odor plume navigation.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.