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NEUROSCIENTIST AND ARTIST DANA SIMMONS FINDS FAMILIAR PATTERNS OF NATURE THROUGH THE LENS OF HER MICROSCOPE

BY BILL GLOVIN

We have billions of neurons floating around in our noggins but—like snowflakes—no two look exactly alike. Dana Simmons, a neuroscientist who studied how autism affects the brain, created the following works of art from the beauty she saw through her use of microscopy.

Purkinje cells are a type of neuron that resides in an area called the cerebellum, a region in the back of the brain that controls movement, posture, and balance. “In this microscopic world, I saw something strikingly familiar—a cell with dozens of branches that made it look like the trees outside my window,” says Simmons. “I found that this branching pattern, which I call the ‘Purkinje Pattern,’ is present all throughout nature on both microscopic and macroscopic scales.”

Simmons, who received her Ph.D. in neurobiology in 2018 from the University of Chicago and created her work as a researcher there, points out that Purkinje cells are unusual neurons because they have many more branches (called dendrites) than typical neurons. These branches collect information from many different inputs.

“The way I got all of the colors is through patching the cell, which means attaching a small glass tube to the cell body,” she explains. “Think of it like sticking a straw into a tennis ball and then flowing fluorescent dye through the straw. It diffuses through the branches in about 45 minutes. The dyes indicate the cell’s activity, and they tell us how one neuron communicates with the surrounding neurons.”

Some of her other artwork focuses on the tiny knob-like spines that dot dendrites like leaves on a tree, which are the molecular sites of learning and memory. “We wanted to see how communication between neurons, taking place at these spines, differed in autism,” says Simmons, adding that, in her artwork, she was influenced by her mother (an art teacher) and her grandfather (an art director and painter). Two of her other major influences are Andy Warhol, known for using everyday figures to create Pop art, and Santiago Ramón y Cajal, an early 20th century Spanish scientist who created drawings of cellular neuroanatomy.

“My goal is to inspire curiosity and promote enthusiasm for science,” says Simmons, who is today a health science communicator and recently moved to Washington, D.C. “I’m really excited about the possibilities for analytical people to think more creatively, and for more creative people to start thinking more analytically. We can all learn a lot from each other.” l revealed the texture of the brain slice in which her Purkinje cells were embedded, and one set with the backlight removed, which is took known faces and everyday objects and presented them in a new light. To Dana, a Purkinje cell has become an everyday research effort to attract curiosity from onlookers.

“Manza” — Manza exhibits the characteristic “Y” shape of Purkinje cell dendrites. While individual Purkinje cells do have slightly different shapes, they almost all include a primary dendrite that bifurcates in two secondary branches, which then split even more to generate a broad and extensive dendritic arbor.

“Molino” — Molino showcases a wheel composed of Purkinje cells. These cells reside in the cerebellum and play a critical role in balance, coordination, and learning new movements. After completing her experiments each day, Dana experimented with the settings on her confocal microscope to manipulate the colors and textures of her micrographs. This piece includes one neuron replicated several times in different colors.

Aincreasing regularity, neuroethics continues to gain traction as a scientific discipline. Since 2014, the International Neuroethics Society and the International Youth Neuroscience Association have teamed to hold a Neuroethics Essay Contest for secondary and high school students from around the world. The contest aims to promote interest in neuroethics among students in high school, university, and early career training programs.

Here are excerpts from the winners in three categories: general audience, academic, and high school. The full essays, with citations, may be referenced by linking to the essay title.

GENERAL INTEREST Beyond Disinformation: Deep Fakes and False Memory Implantation

Erin Morrow, Emory University (United States)

OST SOCIAL MEDIA USERS ARE INTIMATELY familiar with labels on their timelines and feeds for content deemed “manipulated media.” Twitter rolled out new policies last year to address photos or videos found to be “significantly and deceptively altered or fabricated.” The first such content to be flagged on this platform showed thenpresidential candidate Joe Biden appearing to state “We can only re-elect Donald Trump.” In reality, this Kansas City speech was deceptively spliced, edited, and thus taken out of context—but by the time this post received its warning label, it had already garnered over five million views.

Yet, misleadingly cropped video is not the only form of deceptive content being popularized. Also within the jurisdiction of this new regulation is an emerging form of media: deep fakes. These artificial intelligencegenerated creations, often in the form of videos that deceptively portray public figures, have emerged within the past decade as a force of disinformation to be reckoned with. Such videos can now manipulate the facial expressions and speech of these figures with minimal distortion.

Deep fakes of public figures have the potential to influence discourse and decision-making in the realms of politics, public health, and more through a powerful cognitive system: memory. Deep fakes can “implant” false memories; that is, they can cause individuals to recall entirely new events that did not actually occur. Famed memory psychologist Elizabeth Loftus has shown, with others, that certain false memories can be consistently recalled weeks after initial encoding. l