---
OA_place: repository
OA_type: green
_id: '19520'
abstract:
- lang: eng
text: Vertebrates exhibit a wide range of motor behaviors, ranging from swimming
to complex limb-based movements. Here we take advantage of frog metamorphosis,
which captures a swim-to-limb-based movement transformation during the development
of a single organism, to explore changes in the underlying spinal circuits. We
find that the tadpole spinal cord contains small and largely homogeneous populations
of motor neurons (MNs) and V1 interneurons (V1s) at early escape swimming stages.
These neuronal populations only modestly increase in number and subtype heterogeneity
with the emergence of free swimming. In contrast, during frog metamorphosis and
the emergence of limb movement, there is a dramatic expansion of MN and V1 interneuron
number and transcriptional heterogeneity, culminating in cohorts of neurons that
exhibit striking molecular similarity to mammalian motor circuits. CRISPR/Cas9-mediated
gene disruption of the limb MN and V1 determinants FoxP1 and Engrailed-1, respectively,
results in severe but selective deficits in tail and limb function. Our work thus
demonstrates that neural diversity scales exponentially with increasing behavioral
complexity and illustrates striking evolutionary conservation in the molecular
organization and function of motor circuits across species.
acknowledged_ssus:
- _id: Bio
acknowledgement: "We would like to thank the members of the Sweeney Lab (especially
Stavros Papadopoulos and\r\nSophie Gobeil) for their contributions to this project
and, in addition to the lab, Graziana Gatto\r\nand Mario de Bono, for discussion,
and support. We are also grateful to Tom Jessell and Chris\r\nKintner for their
scientific insight and mentorship during the conception of this project. This\r\nproject
would also not have been possible with the technical support of the Matthias Nowak,\r\nVerena
Mayer and the Aquatics as well as the Imaging and Optics Facility support teams\r\n(ISTA).
In addition, we thank our funding sources for providing the resources to do these\r\nexperiments:
FTI Strategy Lower Austria Dissertation Grant Number FT121-D-046 (D.V.);\r\nHorizon
Europe ERC Starting Grant Number 101041551 (L.B.S., F.A.T. and D.V); Special\r\nResearch
Program (SFB) of the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) Project number F7814-B (L.B.S);\r\nNINDS
5R35NS116858 (J.S.D); CZI grant DAF2020-225401 (DOI): 10.37921/120055ratwvi\r\n(R.H.);
NIH grant number R01NS123116 (J.B.B); American Lebanese Syrian Associated\r\nCharities
(ALSAC) (J.B.B.); German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) IFI Grant Number\r\n57515251-91853472
(Z.H.); and Project A.L.S. (S.B-M.). "
article_processing_charge: No
author:
- first_name: David
full_name: Vijatovic, David
id: cf391e77-ec3c-11ea-a124-d69323410b58
last_name: Vijatovic
- first_name: 'Florina Alexandra '
full_name: 'Toma, Florina Alexandra '
id: 2f73f876-f128-11eb-9611-b96b5a30cb0e
last_name: Toma
- first_name: Zoe P
full_name: Harrington, Zoe P
id: a8144562-32c9-11ee-b5ce-d9800628bda2
last_name: Harrington
orcid: 0009-0008-0158-4032
- first_name: Christoph M
full_name: Sommer, Christoph M
id: 4DF26D8C-F248-11E8-B48F-1D18A9856A87
last_name: Sommer
orcid: 0000-0003-1216-9105
- first_name: Robert
full_name: Hauschild, Robert
id: 4E01D6B4-F248-11E8-B48F-1D18A9856A87
last_name: Hauschild
orcid: 0000-0001-9843-3522
- first_name: Alexandra J.
full_name: Trevisan, Alexandra J.
last_name: Trevisan
- first_name: Phillip
full_name: Chapman, Phillip
last_name: Chapman
- first_name: Mara
full_name: Julseth, Mara
id: 1cf464b2-dc7d-11ea-9b2f-f9b1aa9417d1
last_name: Julseth
- first_name: Susan
full_name: Brenner-Morton, Susan
last_name: Brenner-Morton
- first_name: Mariano I.
full_name: Gabitto, Mariano I.
last_name: Gabitto
- first_name: Jeremy S.
full_name: Dasen, Jeremy S.
last_name: Dasen
- first_name: Jay B.
full_name: Bikoff, Jay B.
last_name: Bikoff
- first_name: Lora Beatrice Jaeger
full_name: Sweeney, Lora Beatrice Jaeger
id: 56BE8254-C4F0-11E9-8E45-0B23E6697425
last_name: Sweeney
orcid: 0000-0001-9242-5601
citation:
ama: Vijatovic D, Toma FA, Harrington ZP, et al. Spinal neuron diversity scales
exponentially with swim-to-limb transformation during frog metamorphosis. bioRxiv.
doi:10.1101/2024.09.20.614050
apa: Vijatovic, D., Toma, F. A., Harrington, Z. P., Sommer, C. M., Hauschild, R.,
Trevisan, A. J., … Sweeney, L. B. (n.d.). Spinal neuron diversity scales exponentially
with swim-to-limb transformation during frog metamorphosis. bioRxiv. https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.09.20.614050
chicago: Vijatovic, David, Florina Alexandra Toma, Zoe P Harrington, Christoph
M Sommer, Robert Hauschild, Alexandra J. Trevisan, Phillip Chapman, et al. “Spinal
Neuron Diversity Scales Exponentially with Swim-to-Limb Transformation during
Frog Metamorphosis.” BioRxiv, n.d. https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.09.20.614050.
ieee: D. Vijatovic et al., “Spinal neuron diversity scales exponentially
with swim-to-limb transformation during frog metamorphosis,” bioRxiv. .
ista: Vijatovic D, Toma FA, Harrington ZP, Sommer CM, Hauschild R, Trevisan AJ,
Chapman P, Julseth M, Brenner-Morton S, Gabitto MI, Dasen JS, Bikoff JB, Sweeney
LB. Spinal neuron diversity scales exponentially with swim-to-limb transformation
during frog metamorphosis. bioRxiv, 10.1101/2024.09.20.614050.
mla: Vijatovic, David, et al. “Spinal Neuron Diversity Scales Exponentially with
Swim-to-Limb Transformation during Frog Metamorphosis.” BioRxiv, doi:10.1101/2024.09.20.614050.
short: D. Vijatovic, F.A. Toma, Z.P. Harrington, C.M. Sommer, R. Hauschild, A.J.
Trevisan, P. Chapman, M. Julseth, S. Brenner-Morton, M.I. Gabitto, J.S. Dasen,
J.B. Bikoff, L.B. Sweeney, BioRxiv (n.d.).
corr_author: '1'
date_created: 2025-04-07T08:48:28Z
date_published: 2024-09-27T00:00:00Z
date_updated: 2025-05-14T11:40:13Z
day: '27'
department:
- _id: LoSw
- _id: TiVo
- _id: Bio
- _id: NiBa
doi: 10.1101/2024.09.20.614050
language:
- iso: eng
main_file_link:
- open_access: '1'
url: https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.09.20.614050
month: '09'
oa: 1
oa_version: Preprint
project:
- _id: bd73af52-d553-11ed-ba76-912049f0ac7a
grant_number: FTI21-D-046
name: Development of V1 interneuron diversity during swim-to-walk transition of
Xenopus metamorphosis
- _id: ebb66355-77a9-11ec-83b8-b8ac210a4dae
grant_number: '101041551'
name: Development and Evolution of Tetrapod Motor Circuits
- _id: c08e9ad1-5a5b-11eb-8a69-9d1cf3b07473
grant_number: CZI01
name: Tools for automation and feedback microscopy
publication: bioRxiv
publication_status: submitted
status: public
title: Spinal neuron diversity scales exponentially with swim-to-limb transformation
during frog metamorphosis
type: preprint
user_id: 2DF688A6-F248-11E8-B48F-1D18A9856A87
year: '2024'
...