Category: Cognitive Navigation

How does the brain actually represent the real world with its complex, multianimal settings?

Saikat Ray, Itay Yona, Nadav Elami, Shaked Palgi, Kenneth W. Latimer, Bente Jacobsen, Menno P. Witter, Liora Las, and Nachum Ulanovsky. Hippocampal coding of identity, sex, hierarchy, and affiliation in a social group of wild fruit bats. Science 387,eadk9385(2025). …

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How behavior incorporated into visual compass like route learning and recapitulation strategies might enable convergence to a learned route and its destination?

Amany Azevedo Amin, Andrew Philippides, Paul Graham. Ant visual route navigation: How the fine details of behaviour promote successful route performance and convergence. bioRxiv 2025.01.16.633342; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.01.16.633342

Abstract
“Individually foraging ants use egocentric views as a dominant navigation strategy …

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How does one brain circuit encode memories of both places and events?

Sarthak Chandra, Sugandha Sharma, Rishidev Chaudhuri & Ila Fiete. Episodic and associative memory from spatial scaffolds in the hippocampus. Nature (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-08392-y

Abstract
“Hippocampal circuits in the brain enable two distinct cognitive functions: the construction of spatial maps for

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How to understand the neural basis of natural intelligence?

Angelo Forli, Michael M. Yartsev. Understanding the neural basis of natural intelligence. Cell, 2024, Volume 187, Issue 21, 5833 – 5837

Abstract
Understanding the neural basis of natural intelligence necessitates a paradigm shift: from strict reductionism toward …

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How synaptic plasticity underlies place-field formation and memory encoding during navigation?

Gonzalez, K.C., Negrean, A., Liao, Z. et al. Synaptic basis of feature selectivity in hippocampal neurons. Nature (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-08325-9

Abstract
“A central question in neuroscience is how synaptic plasticity shapes the feature selectivity of neurons in behaving animals1. …

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How learning-associated astrocyte ensembles regulate memory recall?

Williamson, M.R., Kwon, W., Woo, J. et al. Learning-associated astrocyte ensembles regulate memory recall. Nature (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-08170-w

Abstract
The physical manifestations of memory formation and recall are fundamental questions that remain unresolved1. At the cellular level, ensembles …

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How bats use environmental acoustic information to perform acoustic cognitive map–based navigation?

Aya Goldshtein, Xing Chen, Eran Amichai, Arjan Boonman, Lee Harten, Omer Yinon,Yotam Orchan, Ran Nathan, Sivan Toledo, Iain D. Couzin, Yossi Yovel. Acoustic cognitive map–based navigation in echolocating bats.Science 386,561-567(2024).DOI:10.1126/science.adn6269

Editor’s summary
“Insectivorous bats are well known to use …

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Where visual objects are encoded in the mouse brain or how visual objects impact processing within the spatial navigation system?

Dominique Siegenthaler, Henry Denny, Sofía Skromne Carrasco, Johanna Luise Mayer, Adrien Peyrache, Stuart Trenholm, Émilie Macé. Visual objects refine head direction coding. bioRxiv 2024.10.21.619417; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.10.21.619417

Abstract
Animals use visual objects to guide navigation-related behaviors, from hunting prey,

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How hippocampal neuronal activity is aligned with action plans?

Ipshita Zutshi, Athina Apostolelli, Wannan Yang, Zheyang Zheng, Tora Dohi, Edoardo Balzani, Alex Williams, Cristina Savin, Gyorgy Buzsaki. Hippocampal neuronal activity is aligned with action plans.

Abstract
Neurons in the hippocampus are correlated with

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How ants use latent learning without map-like representation of space to navigate?

Leo Clement, Sebastian Schwarz, Antoine Wystrach. Latent learning without map-like representation of space in navigating ants. bioRxiv 2024.08.29.610243; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.08.29.610243

Abstract
“Desert ants are excellent navigators. Each individual learns long foraging routes meandering between the trees and bushes in …

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Whether the entorhinal grid system is also involved in predicting where an animal will be in the next moment?

Ayako Ouchi, Shigeyoshi Fujisawa ,Predictive grid coding in the medial entorhinal cortex.Science 385,776-784(2024).DOI:10.1126/science.ado4166

Editor’s summary
Grid cells in the entorhinal cortex create a coordinate system of the environment for spatial navigation. However, it is not clear whether

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What’s the relationship between world-centered (allocentric) and self-centered (egocentric) frames of spatial coding in the hippocampus during navigation?

Jordan Carpenter, Jan Sigurd Blackstad, David Tingley, Valentin A. Normand, Edvard I. Moser, May-Britt Moser, Benjamin A. Dunn. Investigating egocentric tuning in hippocampal CA1 neurons. Journal of Neuroscience, 13 August 2024, e0040242024; DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0040-24.2024

Abstract
Navigation requires integrating

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How abstract representations are encoded in populations of hippocampal neurons, how they emerge through learning and how they relate to behaviour?

Courellis, H.S., Minxha, J., Cardenas, A.R. et al. Abstract representations emerge in human hippocampal neurons during inference. Nature (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-07799-x

Abstract
Humans have the remarkable cognitive capacity to rapidly adapt to changing environments. Central to this capacity …

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How the brain merge information from across sensory modalities?

Daniel D Kato, Randy M Bruno. Stability of cross-sensory input to primary somatosensory cortex across experience. bioRxiv 2024.08.07.607026; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.08.07.607026

Abstract
Merging information from across sensory modalities is key to forming robust, disambiguated percepts of the world, …

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How the hippocampus supports episodic and spatial memory at the same time?

Alexander Nitsch, Naomi de Haas, Mona M. Garvert, Christian F. Doeller. Integrating episodic and spatial context signals in the hippocampus. bioRxiv 2024.06.24.600445; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.06.24.600445

Abstract
Episodic and spatial memory are the two key components of the mnemonic system

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