Cheng Lyu

All Publications

• Toward building a library of cell type-specific drivers across developmental stages. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Lyu, C., Li, Z., Luo, L. 2023; 120 (35): e2312196120

  View details for DOI 10.1073/pnas.2312196120

  View details for PubMedID 37590431

• Origin of wiring specificity in an olfactory map revealed by neuron type-specific, time-lapse imaging of dendrite targeting. eLife Wong, K. K., Li, T., Fu, T. M., Liu, G., Lyu, C., Kohani, S., Xie, Q., Luginbuhl, D. J., Upadhyayula, S., Betzig, E., Luo, L. 2023; 12

  Abstract

  How does wiring specificity of neural maps emerge during development? Formation of the adult Drosophila olfactory glomerular map begins with patterning of projection neuron (PN) dendrites at the early pupal stage. To better understand the origin of wiring specificity of this map, we created genetic tools to systematically characterize dendrite patterning across development at PN type-specific resolution. We find that PNs use lineage and birth order combinatorially to build the initial dendritic map. Specifically, birth order directs dendrite targeting in rotating and binary manners for PNs of the anterodorsal and lateral lineages, respectively. Two-photon- and adaptive optical lattice light-sheet microscope-based time-lapse imaging reveals that PN dendrites initiate active targeting with direction-dependent branch stabilization on the timescale of seconds. Moreover, PNs that are used in both the larval and adult olfactory circuits prune their larval-specific dendrites and re-extend new dendrites simultaneously to facilitate timely olfactory map organization. Our work highlights the power and necessity of type-specific neuronal access and time-lapse imaging in identifying wiring mechanisms that underlie complex patterns of functional neural maps.

  View details for DOI 10.7554/eLife.85521

  View details for PubMedID 36975203

• Transforming representations of movement from body- to world-centric space. Nature Lu, J., Behbahani, A. H., Hamburg, L., Westeinde, E. A., Dawson, P. M., Lyu, C., Maimon, G., Dickinson, M. H., Druckmann, S., Wilson, R. I. 1800

  Abstract

  When an animal moves through the world, its brain receives a stream of information about the body's translational velocity from motor commands and sensory feedback signals. These incoming signals are referenced to the body, but ultimately, they must be transformed into world-centric coordinates for navigation1,2. Here we show that this computation occurs in the fan-shaped body in the brain of Drosophila melanogaster. We identify two cell types, PFNd and PFNv3-5, that conjunctively encode translational velocity and heading as a fly walks. In these cells, velocity signals are acquired from locomotor brain regions6 and are multiplied with heading signals from the compass system. PFNd neurons prefer forward-ipsilateral movement, whereas PFNv neurons prefer backward-contralateral movement, and perturbing PFNd neurons disrupts idiothetic path integration in walking flies7. Downstream, PFNd and PFNv neurons converge onto hDeltaB neurons, with a connectivity pattern that pools together heading and translation direction combinations corresponding to the same movement in world-centric space. This network motif effectively performs a rotation of the brain's representation of body-centric translational velocity according to the current heading direction. Consistent with our predictions, we observe that hDeltaB neurons form a representation of translationalvelocity in world-centric coordinates. By integrating this representation over time, it should be possible for the brain to form a working memory of the path travelled through the environment8-10.

  View details for DOI 10.1038/s41586-021-04191-x

  View details for PubMedID 34912123