Using a sensitive new imaging molecule, researchers can watch neurons in the larval zebrafish brain spring into action when the fish sees a potential meal, according to a study published 29 January in Current Biology.

Researchers have developed a technique that allows them to remove a functioning placenta from a pregnant mouse late in gestation, they reported 8 January in Nature Protocols.

Researchers have divided the rat brain into 26 structures that are present from birth to adulthood and that can be seen using brain imaging, according to a study published 15 February in Neuroimage.

Robots may be able to help treat children with autism when qualified therapists aren’t available, according to a study published 3 December in IEEE Translational Neural Systems Rehabilitation Engingeering.

Researchers can share and compare brain-imaging data on the UCLA Multimodal Connectivity Database, described in the 28 November Frontiers in Neuroinformatics. The resource builds connectivity matrices, which estimate the strength of connections between regions of the brain.

Researchers have made neurons from the skin cells of mice that model Rett syndrome, according to a study published in the December issue Molecular Psychiatry.

Fish engineered to express fluorescent proteins allow researchers to follow the paths of migrating mitochondria, the cell’s energy producers, according to a study published 14 November in The Journal of Neuroscience.

Of the thousands of DNA variants linked to autism, those that evolved later are the most likely to be harmful, according to a study published 28 November in Nature.

In a virtual reality game intended to improve social skills in teenagers with autism, the players must ask computer avatars the right questions while seeming engaged in the conversation. The game was described 27 September in IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering.

Autworks, a new online tool, has data on almost 20,000 human genes linked to nearly 3,000 disorders. The tool, published 28 November in BMC Medical Genomics, creates gene-network maps for each disorder and highlights the overlap between them.