Areas of Research
Auditory neurons demonstrate remarkable selectivity for a restricted set of sound features, and they can maintain this selectivity across a wide range of auditory environments. These abilities are fundamental for auditory processing and are of great interest for understanding how the auditory cortex accurately encodes complex sounds, such as speech. My research is focused on uncovering the synaptic and circuit-level mechanisms that that support these abilities. I am particularly interested in cortical mechanisms that can enhance or suppress the neuronal representation of specific features of sounds because these allow neurons to fine-tune their receptive fields, a key feature of cortical sound encoding. I utilize 2-photon calcium imaging in awake animals, brain slice electrophysiology, optogenetic manipulations, and animal behavioral assays to address these questions.
People
News Coverage
Learning how one element—zinc—helps millions of nerve cells communicate - EurekAlert!, August 26, 2020
Sound Processing: A new role for zinc in the brain - eLife, October 6, 2017
Publications
Bender PTR, McCollum M, Boyd-Pratt H, Mendelson BZ, and Anderson CT (in press). Synaptic zinc potentiates AMPA receptor function in mouse auditory cortex. Cell Reports
Wu T, Manoj K., Zhang J, Shao S, Drobizhev M, McCollum M, Anderson CT, Wang Y, Almeida A, Tian X, Zhang Y, Tzounopoulos T, Ai H. (2023). A Genetically Encoded Far-Red Fluorescent Indicator for Imaging Synaptically-Released Zn2+. Science Advances. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.add2058
Kumar M, Xiong S, Tzounopoulos T, Anderson CT (2019). Cell-Specific Sound Frequency Tuning and Enhanced Frequency Discrimination Acuity by Synaptic Zinc Signaling in Mouse Auditory Cortex. Journal of Neuroscience Jan 30;39(5):854-865.
Anderson CT* and Kumar M*, Xiong S, Tzounopoulos T (2017). Cell-specific gain modulation by synaptically released zinc in cortical circuits of audition. eLife 2017;6:e29893 *Equal contribution
Joshi A, Kalappa BI, Anderson CT, Tzounopoulos T (2016) Cell-Specific Cholinergic Modulation of Excitability of Layer 5B Principal Neurons in Mouse Auditory Cortex. Journal of Neuroscience, 0780-16.2016
Kalappa BI, Anderson CT, Goldberg J, Lippard SJ, Tzounopoulos T (2015). AMPA Receptor Inhibition by Synaptically Released Zinc. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences; doi: 10.1073/pnas.1512296112
Zastrow ML, Radford RJ, Wen C, Anderson CT, Zhang DY, Loas A, Tzounopoulos T, Lippard SJ (2015). Reaction-Based Probes for Imaging Mobile Zinc in Live Cells and Tissues. Journal of the American Chemical Society: Sensors doi: 10.1021/acssensors.5b00022
Anderson CT, Radford RJ, Zastrow ML, Zhang DY, Apfel U, Lippard SJ, Tzounopoulos T (2015). Modulation of extrasynaptic NMDA receptors by synaptic and tonic zinc. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences; E2705–E2714, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1503348112.
Perez-Rosello T, Anderson CT, Ling C, Lippard SJ, Tzounopoulos T. (2015), Tonic zinc inhibits spontaneous neuronal firing in dorsal cochlear nucleus principal neurons by enhancing glycinergic neurotransmission. Neurobiology of Disease; http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.nbd.2015.03.012
Joshi A* and Middleton JW*, Anderson CT, Borges K, Suter BA, Shepherd GM, Tzounopoulos T. (2015), Cell-Specific Activity-Dependent Fractionation of Layer 2/3→5B Excitatory Signaling in Mouse Auditory Cortex. Journal of Neuroscience; 35(7):3112-23. *Equal contribution
Perez-Rosello T, Anderson CT, Schopfer FJ, Zhao Y, Gilad D, Salvatore SR, Freeman BA, Hershfinkel M, Aizenman E, Tzounopoulos T. (2013), Synaptic Zn2+ inhibits neurotransmitter release by promoting endocannabinoid synthesis. Journal of Neuroscience; 33(22):9259-72.
Srivastava DP, Woolfrey KM, Jones KA, Anderson CT, Russell TA, Lee H, Photowala H, Wokosin DL, Yasvoina MV, Ozdinler PH, Shepherd MGM, Penzes P. (2012) Autism-associated mutation in EPAC2 reveals asymmetric control of dendritic arborization. PLoS Biology; 10(6) :e1001350
Qiu S* and Anderson CT*, Levitt P, Shepherd GMG. (2011) Circuit-specific intracortical hyperconnectivity in mice with deletion of the autism-associated Met receptor tyrosine kinase. Journal of Neuroscience; 31(15): 5855-5864. *Equal contribution
Anderson CT* and Sheets PL*, Kiritani T, Shepherd GMG (2010) Sublayer-specific microcircuits of corticospinal and corticostriatal neurons in motor cortex. Nature Neuroscience; 13: 739-744. *Equal Contribution
Homma K, Miller KK, Anderson CT, Sengupta S, Du GG, Aguiñaga S, Cheatham M, Dallos P, Zheng J (2010) Interaction between CFTR and prestin (SLC26A5). Biochimica et Biophysica Acta 1798:1029-1040.
Zheng J, Anderson CT, Miller KK, Cheatham M, and Dallos P. (2009) Identifying components of the hair-cell interactome involved in cochlear amplification. BMC Genomics; 10:1, 127.
Cheatham MA, Low-Zeddies S, Naik K, Edge R, Zheng J, Anderson CT and Dallos P. (2009) A chimera analysis of prestin knock-out mice. Journal of Neuroscience; 29(38): 12000-8.
Yu J, Anderson CT, Kiritani T, Sheets PL, Wokosin DL, Wood L, Shepherd GM (2008) Local-circuit phenotypes of layer 5 neurons in motor-frontal cortex of YFP-H mice. Frontiers in Neural Circuits; 2:6.
Dallos P, Wu X, Cheatham MA, Gao J, Zheng J, Anderson CT, Jia S, Wang X, Cheng WH, Sengupta S, He DZ, Zuo J (2008) Prestin-based outer hair cell motility is necessary for Mammalian cochlear amplification. Neuron; 58:333-339.
Cheatham MA, Zheng J, Huynh KH, Du GG, Edge RM, Anderson CT, Zuo J, Ryan AF, Dallos P. (2007). Evaluation of an independent prestin mouse model derived from the 129S1 strain. Audiology and Neurotology; 12: 378-390.
Anderson CT and Zheng J. (2007). Isolation of outer hair cells from the cochlear epithelium in whole-mount preparation using Laser Capture Microdissection. Journal of Neuroscience Methods; 162(1-2): 229-34.
Zheng J, Du GG, Anderson CT, Keller JP, Orem A, Dallos P, Cheatham M. (2006). Analysis of the oligomeric structure of the motor protein prestin. Journal of Biological Chemistry; 281 (29): 19916-24.
Roberts LW, Warner TD, Anderson CT, Smithpeter MV, Rogers MK. (2004). Schizophrenia research participants' responses to protocol safeguards: recruitment, consent, and debriefing. Schizophrenia Research; 67 (2-3): 283-291.