Neuromodulatory and molecular control of plastic behaviors in simple neural systems

Understanding how brains adapt to changing internal states and external environments remains a central challenge in neuroscience. Simple model systems, such as Aplysia, C. elegans, and Drosophila, have long provided powerful experimental leverage to dissect how neural circuits are modified to support behavioral plasticity. These systems offer unparalleled access to the molecular, cellular, and circuit-level mechanisms through which experience and context shape action. Critically, neuromodulatory signals, ranging from monoamines to neuropeptides, play a pivotal role in dynamically reconfiguring synaptic and network states. These modulators act through diverse molecular cascades to influence protein expression, ion channel function, synaptic release machinery, and structural plasticity. Understanding these interactions will provide a tractable window into the molecular and cellular logic of behavioral adaptation.

Recent developments in cell-type-specific transcriptomics, translatomics, or proteomics approaches have allowed researchers to identify precise molecular signatures associated with distinct behavioral states and adaptive transitions. These advances revealed aspects of experience-dependent gene expression, but the whole picture of transcriptional- or translational-regulations and the underlying molecular or cellular mechanisms remains to be understood.

This Research Topic will investigate how environmental cues and internal neuromodulatory signals, independently and in combination, reshape molecular, synaptic, and circuit-level plasticity to produce behavioral change. By focusing on well-characterized invertebrate models, contributors will reveal how discrete molecular events scale up to circuit-level reorganization.
This work is expected to provide key insights into neuromodulator-gated transcriptional programs, context-dependent synaptic tuning, and adaptive network reconfiguration.

To this aim, this collection will serve as a hub welcoming contributions across the following integrated areas:

• Neuromodulatory control of plasticity in invertebrate learning models
Dissect the role of neuromodulators such as serotonin, dopamine, and neuropeptides in regulating learning-induced plasticity in Aplysia, Drosophila, or C. elegans.

• Environmental modulation of neural circuit flexibility
Explore how external cues such as circadian light cycles, thermal gradients, acute stress, or pharmacological exposure modulate circuit dynamics and/or behavior.

• Synaptic plasticity in minimal neural networks
Examine how changes at specific synapses or protein expression generate behavioral shifts.

• Molecular signatures of behaviorally-relevant neuromodulation
Using transcriptomic, translatomic, and proteomic profiling to obtain the landscape of molecular pathways involved in behavioral flexibility.

• Translational insights from invertebrate neuromodulation to human neurological disorders
Highlighting conserved evolutionary pathways involved in mood, addiction, or pathological conditions.

Article types and fees

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Clinical Trial
• Data Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• ... View all formats

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Article types

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Clinical Trial
• Data Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• Opinion
• Original Research
• Perspective
• Review
• Systematic Review
• Technology and Code

Keywords: plasticity, behavior, neural circuit, molecular, neural systems, invertebrate, drosophila, c elegans, neuromodulation, synaptic, network, experience, context-dependent, Aplysia

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.