Halassa Lab
Project 2
A role of mediodorsal thalamus in inference:
Tupaia Belangeri is a primate relative with high level visual system, large cognitive capacity and with neural circuits that are amenable to genetic access through viral tools. Together, these features allow for circuit dissection of complex cognitive functions (e.g. Lam et al., 2025). Taking advantage of this, we developed and trained Tupaia subjects on a hierarchical inference task in which they receive a series of visual cues in blocks of trials where their meaning is either instructed or inferred. We find that subjects can appropriately infer the meaning of visual cues based on the information from instructed blocks. Further, our preliminary data suggests that inactivation of prelimbic inputs to the medial dorsal (MD) thalamus disrupts inference performance.
Address
Fralin Biomedical Research Inst. at VTC
2 Riverside Circle
Roanoke, VA 24016
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