Parallel Neuron Groups in the Drosophila Brain

TL;DR

This paper identifies and characterizes a new neural structure called Parallel Neuron Groups in the Drosophila brain, revealing their properties, distribution, and raising questions about their functional roles.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of Parallel Neuron Groups, describes their properties, distribution, and asymmetry, and highlights their potential significance in neural processing.

Findings

Approximately twenty large parallel groups identified

Groups contain about 1000 neurons out of 65,000

Groups have distinctive input-output properties

Abstract

The full connectome of an adult Drosophila enables a search for novel neural structures in the insect brain. I describe a new neural structure, called a Parallel Neuron Group (PNG). Two neurons are called parallel if they share a significant number of input neurons and output neurons. Most pairs of neurons in the Drosophila brain have very small parallel match. There are about twenty larger groups of neurons for which any pair of neurons in the group has a high match. These are the parallel groups. Parallel groups contain only about 1000 out of the 65,000 neurons in the brain, and have distinctive properties. There are groups in the right mushroom bodies, the antennal lobes, the lobula, and in two central neuropils (GNG and EB). Most parallel groups do not have lateral symmetry. A group usually has one major input neuron, which inputs to all the neurons in the group, and a small number of major output neurons. The major input and output neurons are laterally asymmetric. Parallel neuron groups present puzzles, such as: what does a group do, that could not be done by one larger neuron? Do all neurons in a group fire in synchrony, or do they perform different functions? Why are they laterally asymmetric? These may merit further investigation.