John C. Tuthill

Jan 17, 2025 | thetransmitter.org | Anna Victoria Molofsky |John C. Tuthill |Nicole Rust |Jason Shepherd

Twenty years ago, a remarkable discovery upended our understanding of the range of elements that can shape neuronal function: A team in Europe demonstrated that enzymatic digestion of the extracellular matrix (ECM)—a latticework of proteins that surrounds all brain cells—could restore plasticity to the visual cortex even after the region’s “critical period” had ended. Other studies followed, showing that ECM digestion could also alter learning in the hippocampus and other brain circuits.

Jan 13, 2025 | thetransmitter.org | John C. Tuthill |Nicole Rust |Angie Voyles Askham |Austin Coley

Professor of neurobiology and biophysicsUniversity of Washington Share this article: Tags: Craft and careers, Animal models, Drosophila, early career researchers, Education, Teaching On a muggy July evening in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, as vacationers lounged on nearby beaches, a group of scientists clustered around a solitary fruit fly suspended in a virtual reality flight simulator. The scientists flicked a switch to bathe the tethered fly in spooky red light.

Jan 8, 2025 | thetransmitter.org | John C. Tuthill |Terrence Sejnowski |Paul Middlebrooks |Claudia Lopez Lloreda

John Tuthill is professor of neurobiology and biophysics at the University of Washington. His lab investigates how the nervous system keeps track of the body through the sense of proprioception, and how proprioceptive neural signals are used to guide motor patterns like walking.