Cross-species neuroscience: closing the explanatory gap

Author:

Barron Helen C.12ORCID,Mars Rogier B.23,Dupret David1,Lerch Jason P.24,Sampaio-Baptista Cassandra25ORCID

Affiliation:

1. Medical Research Council Brain Network Dynamics Unit, Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Mansfield Road, Oxford OX1 3TH, UK

2. Wellcome Centre for Integrative Neuroimaging, University of Oxford, FMRIB, John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford OX3 9DU, UK

3. Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior, Radboud University, 6525 AJ Nijmegen, The Netherlands

4. Department of Medical Biophysics, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5G 1L7

5. Institute of Neuroscience and Psychology, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QB, UK

Abstract

Neuroscience has seen substantial development in non-invasive methods available for investigating the living human brain. However, these tools are limited to coarse macroscopic measures of neural activity that aggregate the diverse responses of thousands of cells. To access neural activity at the cellular and circuit level, researchers instead rely on invasive recordings in animals. Recent advances in invasive methods now permit large-scale recording and circuit-level manipulations with exquisite spatio-temporal precision. Yet, there has been limited progress in relating these microcircuit measures to complex cognition and behaviour observed in humans. Contemporary neuroscience thus faces an explanatory gap between macroscopic descriptions of the human brain and microscopic descriptions in animal models. To close the explanatory gap, we propose adopting a cross-species approach. Despite dramatic differences in the size of mammalian brains, this approach is broadly justified by preserved homology. Here, we outline a three-armed approach for effective cross-species investigation that highlights the need to translate different measures of neural activity into a common space. We discuss how a cross-species approach has the potential to transform basic neuroscience while also benefiting neuropsychiatric drug development where clinical translation has, to date, seen minimal success. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Key relationships between non-invasive functional neuroimaging and the underlying neuronal activity’.

Funder

Wellcome Trust

Medical Research Council

Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council

Publisher

The Royal Society

Subject

General Agricultural and Biological Sciences,General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology

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