The Science Behind Better Visualizing Brain Function

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OhOne of the current challenges in understanding how the human brain works is being able to visualize its activity in real time. Our brain is a collection of nerve cells, or neurons, that receive, transform, and send signals to other cells to create thoughts, decisions, and memories. To date, researchers have illuminated the outgoing signals of nerve cells using techniques such as electrophysiology, but found the incoming signals too fast and weak to capture.

Now described in a recent article published in Natural methodsneuroscientists have developed a way to detect incoming chemical signals. “What we invented here is a way to measure information coming from different sources in neurons, and this is a critical element that is missing in neuroscience research,” explained the study’s lead author, Kaspar Podgorski, of the Allen Institute in Seattle, in a statement.

Podgorski and an international team of collaborators from the United States, Germany, Italy, London and Austria designed variants of a protein, iGluSnFR, to record incoming signals from brain cells. Signals from nerve cells bridge the gap between neurons by sending chemical messengers across the gap, or synapse. The most common messenger of learning, memory and feelings is the glutamate molecule, for which the iGluSnFR protein is a good tracking indicator.

Read more: “A new door to the brain”

By testing the performance of 70 iGluSnFR variants in mouse brains, the researchers discovered two variants sensitive enough to detect even the weakest incoming neuronal signals. Glutamate indicators have been tested in mouse models in various brain regions, including the neocortex, thalamus, hippocampus and midbrain, and found to provide a window into the flow of information between neurons of different types. Coupled with existing techniques for monitoring outgoing signals, iGluSnFR variants offer a way to interpret entire streams of information in the brain.

“I feel like what we’re doing here is adding the connections between these neurons, and in doing so we now understand the order of the words on the pages and what they mean,” Podgorski continued.

These scientific advances have implications for the treatment of a range of diseases linked to disruptions in glutamate signaling, including Alzheimer’s disease, schizophrenia and autism. Being able to visualize synapse activity paves the way for understanding the mechanisms behind brain disorders and then developing drugs that restore normal synaptic function.

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Main image: Juan Gaertner / Shutterstock

• Devin Reese

  Published on January 2, 2026

  Devin Reese is the editor-in-chief of Natural history and a science writer based in Alexandria, Virginia.