Project Overview
The systems neuroscientist’s dream is to be able to simultaneously record and manipulate, at high temporal resolution, the activity of many thousands of neurons in multiple brain areas in a freely-behaving animal engaged in a computationally interesting behavior. Advances in functional optical imaging technologies have put this vision within grasp, but significant challenges remain: Commercial head-fixed fluorescence microscopes are too heavy for small animals such as juvenile songbirds, have a limited field of view, and do not easily incorporate imaging with electrophysiology.
Inspired by the success of the UCLA miniscope (miniscope.org), we have set out to build our own microscope system tiny enough to allow recording in a juvenile songbird. We realized that it is possible to dramatically miniaturize the image acquisition circuitry, and also add more functionality, such as electrophysiological recording. We have also modified the optical pathway to allow a more compact design while increasing the field of view.
