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The locust standard brain: a 3D standard of the central complex as a platform for neural network analysis

1
Fachbereich Biologie, Tierphysiologie, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Marburg, Germany
2
Neuroscience Program, SRI International, Menlo Park, CA, USA
Many insects use the pattern of polarized light in the sky for spatial orientation and navigation. We have investigated the polarization vision system in the desert locust. To create a common platform for anatomical studies on polarization vision pathways, Kurylas et al. (2008) have generated a three-dimensional (3D) standard brain from confocal microscopy image stacks of 10 male brains, using two different standardization methods, the Iterative Shape Averaging (ISA) procedure and the Virtual Insect Brain (VIB) protocol. Comparison of both standardization methods showed that the VIB standard is ideal for comparative volume analysis of neuropils, whereas the ISA standard is the method of choice to analyze the morphology and connectivity of neurons. The central complex is a key processing stage for polarization information in the locust brain. To investigate neuronal connections between diverse central-complex neurons, we generated a higher-resolution standard atlas of the central complex and surrounding areas, using the ISA method based on brain sections from 20 individual central complexes. To explore the usefulness of this atlas, two central-complex neurons, a polarization-sensitive columnar neuron (type CPU1a) and a tangential neuron that is activated during flight, the giant fan-shaped (GFS) neuron, were reconstructed 3D from brain sections. To examine whether the GFS neuron is a candidate to contribute to synaptic input to the CPU1a neuron, we registered both neurons into the standardized central complex. Visualization of both neurons revealed a potential connection of the CPU1a and GFS neurons in layer II of the upper division of the central body.
Keywords:
iterative shape averaging, virtual insect brain, single-cell registration, central complex, desert locust, digital neuroanatomy, standard brain, 3D
Citation:
el Jundi B, Heinze S, Lenschow C, Kurylas A, Rohlfing T, and Homberg U (2010). The locust standard brain: a 3D standard of the central complex as a platform for neural network analysis. Front. Syst. Neurosci. 3:21. doi: 10.3389/neuro.06.021.2009
Received:
04 September 2009;
 Paper pending published:
29 October 2009;
Accepted:
19 December 2009;
 Published online:
03 February 2010.

Edited by:

Randolf Menzel, Freie Universitat Berlin, Germany

Reviewed by:

Jürgen Rybak, Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology, Germany
Hanna Mustaparta, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway
Copyright:
© 2010 el Jundi, Heinze, Lenschow, Kurylas, Rohlfing, and Homberg. This is an open-access article subject to an exclusive license agreement between the authors and the Frontiers Research Foundation, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original authors and source are credited.
*Correspondence:
Uwe Homberg, Fachbereich Biologie, Tierphysiologie, Philipps-Universität Marburg, D-35032 Marburg, Germany. e-mail: homberg@staff.uni-marburg.de
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