Mental strength and history of winning play an important role in the determination of social dominance. However, the neural circuits mediating these intrinsic and extrinsic factors have remained unclear. Working in mice, we identified a dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC) neural population showing "effort"-related firing during moment-to-moment competition in the dominance tube test. Activation or inhibition of the dmPFC induces instant winning or losing, respectively. In vivo optogenetic-based long-term potentiation and depression experiments establish that the mediodorsal thalamic input to the dmPFC mediates long-lasting changes in the social dominance status that are affected by history of winning. The same neural circuit also underlies transfer of dominance between different social contests. These results provide a framework for understanding the circuit basis of adaptive and pathological social behaviors.

Many neurodegenerative and neurological diseases are rooted in dysfunction of the neuroimmune system; therefore, manipulating this system has strong therapeutic potential. Prior work has shown that exposing mice to flickering lights at 40 Hz drives gamma frequency (ϳ40 Hz) neural activity and recruits microglia, the primary immune cells of the brain, revealing a novel method to manipulate the neuroimmune system. However, the biochemical signaling mechanisms between 40 Hz neural activity and immune recruitment remain unknown. Here, we exposed wild-type male mice to 5-60 min of 40 Hz or control flicker and assessed cytokine and phosphoprotein networks known to play a role in immune function. We found that 40 Hz flicker leads to increases in the expression of cytokines which promote microglial phagocytic states, such as IL-6 and IL-4, and increased expression of microglial chemokines, such as macrophagecolony-stimulating factor and monokine induced by interferon-␥. Interestingly, cytokine effects differed as a function of stimulation frequency, revealing a range of neuroimmune effects of stimulation. To identify possible mechanisms underlying cytokine expression, we quantified the effect of the flicker on intracellular signaling pathways known to regulate cytokine levels. We found that a 40 Hz flicker upregulates phospho-signaling within the nuclear factor-light-chain-enhancer of activated B cells (NF-B) and mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathways. While cytokine expression increased after 1 h of 40 Hz flicker stimulation, protein phosphorylation in the NF-B pathway was upregulated within minutes. Importantly, the cytokine expression profile induced by 40 Hz flicker was different from cytokine changes in response to acute neuroinflammation induced by lipopolysaccharides. These results are the first, to our knowledge, to show how visual stimulation rapidly induces critical neuroimmune signaling in healthy animals.

Fluoropolymers have found broad applications for many decades. Considerable efforts have focused on expanding access toward main-chain fluorinated polymers. In contrast to previous polymerizations of gaseous fluoroethylenes conducted at elevated temperatures and with high-pressure metallic vessels, we here report the development of a photoorganocatalyzed reversible-deactivation radical alternating copolymerization of chlorotrifluoroethylene (CTFE) and vinyl ethers (VEs) at room temperature and ambient pressure by exposing to LED light irradiation. This method enables the synthesis of various fluorinated alternating copolymers with low Đ and high chain-end fidelity, allowing an iterative switch of the copolymerization between “ON” and “OFF” states, the preparation of fluorinated block alternating copolymers, as well as postsynthetic modifications.

Single-crystal CoSe2 nanorods have been used as the electrocatalyst for highly efficient dye-sensitized solar cells.