Sensory ecology: see me, hear me

The animal world is replete with vibrant colours: these are often used as display signals and selection has solved a fundamental problem in information transfer by enhancing the detectability of these signals against the backgrounds on which they are perceived by the particular sensory systems of their receivers.     

See me, hear me, touch me: multisensory integration in lateral occipital-temporal cortex

Our understanding of multisensory integration has advanced because of recent functional neuroimaging studies of three areas in human lateral occipito-temporal cortex: superior temporal sulcus, area LO and area MT (V5). Superior temporal sulcus is activated strongly in response to meaningful auditory and visual stimuli, but responses to tactile stimuli have not been well studied. Area LO shows strong activation in response to both visual and tactile shape information, but not to auditory representations of objects. Area MT, an important region for processing visual motion, also shows weak activation in response to tactile motion, and a signal that drops below resting baseline in response to auditory motion. Within superior temporal sulcus, a patchy organization of regions is activated in response to auditory, visual and multisensory stimuli. This organization appears similar to that observed in polysensory areas in macaque superior temporal sulcus, suggesting that it is an anatomical substrate for multisensory integration. A patchy organization might also be a neural mechanism for integrating disparate representations within individual sensory modalities, such as representations of visual form and visual motion.     

Please release me

In this issue of Neuron, Südhof and colleagues determine which of the eight Ca(2+)-binding synaptotagmin isoforms expressed in brain can support synchronous neurotransmitter release at mammalian CNS synapses. Unexpectedly, only three-synaptotagmin-1, -2, and -9-can serve as Ca(2+) sensors for fast transmission. Further characterization reveals the unique ability of each isoform to shape neurotransmission.     

Tie me up, tie me down: inhibiting RNA polymerase

Mechanistic understanding of antibiotic action can yield crucial insights that aid in the design of new antibiotics. In this issue, Mukhopadhyay et al. (2008) uncover the mechanism by which the antibiotic myxopyronin inhibits bacterial RNA polymerase, suggesting a new target region in RNA polymerase for inhibitor design.     

Show me the MUN-y

The structure of the MUN domain of the synaptic protein Munc13-1 by Li et?al., in this issue of Structure, shows that seemingly disparate regulators of SNARE-mediated membrane fusion are highly conserved at the structural level.