Responsibilities
Director & Head of Dept. Circuits – Computation – Models, MPI for Biological Intelligence
Contact
Department Circuits – Computation – Models
Phone:
+49 (0)89 / 8578-3250
Email:
borst@neuro.mpg.de
Website:
https://www.bi.mpg.de/borst
Further Information
Primary research focus: Cellular & Systems Neuroscience
Second research focus: Theoretical Neuroscience & Technical Applications
Third research focus: Molecular & Developmental Neuroscience
Keywords: visual system, motion vision, Drosophila, Calcium imaging, modeling
Brief research description: In our department, we are interested in how the brain computes. In particular, we want to understand neural information processing at the level of individual neurons and small neural circuits. As an example for neural computation, we study visual course control in the fruit fly Drosophila. This is a tractable system for the following reasons: It involves computations of modest complexity, these computations are implemented in circuits that contain a rather limited number of neurons (typically 10-20), and each of these neurons can be genetically targeted allowing manipulation and recording of its activity
GSN students
- Current: Sandra Fendl, Maria Bianca Leonte, Nadezhda Pirogova, Nikolai Hörmann, Florian Richter, Abhishek Mishra, Jonatan Malis, Aicha Haji Ali, Amalia Braun
- Graduated: Dr. Georg Ammer, Dr. Aljoscha Leonhardt, Dr. Katarina Pankova, Dr. Armin Bahl, Dr. Franz Weber, Dr. Matthias Meier, Dr. Etienne Serbe, Dr. Michael Drews, Dr. Anna Schützenberger, Dr. Matthew Maisak, Dr. Christian Busch
Selected publications:
Joesch M, Schnell B, Raghu SV, Reiff DF, Borst A (2010) ON and OFF pathways in Drosophila motion vision. Nature 468: 300-304.
Maisak MS, Haag J, Ammer G, Serbe E, Meier M, Leonhardt A, Schilling T, Bahl A, Rubin GM, Nern A, Dickson BJ, Reiff DF, Hopp E, Borst A (2013) A directional tuning map of Drosophila elementary motion detectors. Nature 500: 212-216.
Mauss AS, Pankova K, Arenz A, Nern A, Rubin GM, Borst A (2015) Neural circuit to integrate opposing motions in the visual field. Cell 162: 351-362.
Haag J, Arenz A, Serbe E, Gabbiani F, Borst A (2016) Complementary mechanisms create direction selectivity in the fly. eLife 5: e17421.
Arenz A, Drews MS, Richter FG, Ammer G, Borst A (2017) The temporal tuning of the Drosophila motion detectors is determined by the dynamics of their input elements. Curr Biol 27: 929-944.