Larval zebrafish behavioral and two-photon imaging data in response to multifeature visual stimuli (random-dot-motion and luminance) – Slangewal et al. 2026

DOI

Animals continuously extract and evaluate diverse sensory information from the environment to guide behavior. Yet, how neural circuits integrate multiple, potentially conflicting, inputs remains poorly understood. Here, we use larval zebrafish to address this question, leveraging their robust optomotor response to coherent random dot motion and phototaxis towards light. We demonstrate that animals employ an additive behavioral algorithm of three visual features: motion coherence, luminance level, and changes in luminance. Using brain-wide two-photon imaging, we identify the loci of these computations, with the anterior hindbrain emerging as a multifeature integration hub. Through single-cell neurotransmitter and morphological analyses of functionally identified neurons, we characterize potential connections within and across computational nodes. These experiments reveal three parallel and converging computational pathways, matching our behavioral results. Our study provides a mechanistic brain-wide account of how a vertebrate brain integrates multiple features to drive sensorimotor decisions, bridging behavioral algorithms with their neural implementation.

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DOI https://doi.org/10.48606/tus7hs1zv77phbtv
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Metadata Access https://www.radar-service.eu/oai/OAIHandler?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=datacite&identifier=10.48606/tus7hs1zv77phbtv
Provenance
Creator Bahl, Armin ORCID logo
Publisher University of Konstanz
Contributor RADAR
Publication Year 2026
Funding Reference Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft https://ror.org/018mejw64 ROR BA 5923/1-1 ; European Research Council https://ror.org/0472cxd90 ROR 101075541 CollectiveDecisions; Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft https://ror.org/018mejw64 ROR EXC 2117 – 422037984 ; Zukunftskolleg Konstanz University of Konstanz Other ; Max Planck Society https://ror.org/01hhn8329 ROR IMPRS-QBEE ; Boehringer Ingelheim Fonds https://ror.org/00dkye506 ROR ; National Institute of Health https://ror.org/05h1kgg64 ROR U19NS104653
Rights Open Access; Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International; info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode
OpenAccess true
Contact Bahl, Armin (University of Konstanz)
Representation
Language English
Resource Type Behavior and two-photon imaging data; Dataset
Format application/x-tar
Discipline Biology; Life Sciences
Spatial Coverage GERMANY