Study Maps Neurons of Octopus Visual System

Researchers at University of Oregon (UO) have created a detailed map of the octopus’s visual system, classifying different types of neurons in a part of the brain devoted to vision. The map is a resource for other neuroscientists, providing details that could guide future experiments and understanding of the brain’s evolution and visual systems.

The last common ancestor between octopuses and humans was 500 million years ago, and the species have since evolved in very different contexts. So, scientists didn’t know whether the parallels in visual systems extended beyond the eyes, or whether the octopus was instead using completely different kinds of neurons and brain circuits to achieve similar results. 

While not traditionally used as a study subject in Cris Niell’s lab at UO, the cephalopod quickly captured the interest of the University’s neuroscientists. Unlike mice, which are not known for having good vision, “octopuses have an amazing visual system, and large fraction of their brain is dedicated to visual processing,” Niell said. They have an eye that's remarkably similar to the human eye, but after that, the brain is completely different, he adds.

“Seeing how the octopus eye convergently evolved similarly to ours, it’s cool to think about how the octopus visual system could be a model for understanding brain complexity more generally,” says Mea Songco-Casey, a graduate student in Niell’s lab and the first author on the paper. “For example, are there fundamental cell types that are required for this very intelligent, complex brain?”

The team used genetic techniques to identify different types of neurons in the octopus’s optic lobe, the part of the brain that’s devoted to vision. They picked out six major classes of neurons, distinguished based on the chemical signals they send. Looking at the activity of certain genes in those neurons then revealed further subtypes, providing clues to more specific roles.

In some cases, the researchers pinpointed particular groups of neurons in distinctive spatial arrangements. For instance, a ring of neurons around the optic lobe that all signal using a molecule called octopamine. Fruit flies use this molecule, which is similar to adrenaline, to increase visual processing when the fly is active. So, it could perhaps have a similar role in octopuses.  “Now that we know there's this very specific cell type, we can start to go in and figure out what it does,” Niell says.

About a third of the neurons in the data didn’t quite look fully developed. The octopus brain keeps growing and adding new neurons over the animal’s lifespan. These immature neurons, not yet integrated into brain circuits, were a sign of the brain in the process of expanding. However, the map didn’t reveal sets of neurons that clearly transferred over from humans or other mammalian brains, as the researchers thought it might.

“At the obvious level, the neurons don't map onto each other—they're using different neurotransmitters,” Niell says. “But maybe they're doing the same kinds of computations, just in a different way.”

Digging deeper will also require getting a better handle on cephalopod genetics. Because the octopus hasn’t traditionally been used as a lab animal, many of the tools that are used for precise genetic manipulation in fruit flies or mice don’t yet exist for the octopus.  

“There are a lot of genes where we have no idea what their function is, because we haven't sequenced the genomes of a lot of cephalopods,” says post-doc Judit Pungor. Without genetic data from related species as a point of comparison, it’s harder to deduce the function of particular neurons.

Niell’s team is now working to map the octopus’s brain beyond the optic lobe to evaluate how some of the genes they focused on in this study show up elsewhere. They are also recording from neurons in the optic lobe to determine how they process the visual scene. The research might increase understanding of the cephalopod and provide new insights into human evolution.

The findings were published recently in the journal Current Biology.