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Mobilizing the base of neuroscience data: the case of neuronal morphologies

Nature Reviews Neuroscience volume 7, pages 318–324 (2006)Cite this article

Abstract

Despite the explosive growth of bioinformatics, data sharing has not yet become routine in neuroscience, possibly because of several broad-spanning issues, from data heterogeneity to privacy regulations. We present the case of neuronal morphology as an ideal example of shareable data. Drawing from recent experience, we argue that the tremendous research potential of existing (and largely unused) digital reconstructions should diffuse any reticence to sharing this type of data.

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Figure 1: Digital reconstruction of neuronal morphology.
Figure 2: Examples of applications of digital reconstructions.
Figure 3: Numerical summaries of the neuronal morphologies inventoried so far under the Neuroscience Information Framework contracted by the National Institutes of Health and in partnership with the Society for Neuroscience.
Figure 4: Possible data-mining scenarios enabled by large-scale archiving of neuronal morphologies.

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Acknowledgements

I am grateful to all members of my laboratory. In particular, illustration material for this manuscript was contributed by K. Brown, D. Donohue, M. Ferrante, M. Halavi, D. Ropireddy and A. Samsonovich. This work was supported in part by a grant co-funded by the National Institute of Neural Disorders and Stroke, the National Institute of Mental Health and the National Science Foundation (NSF) under the Human Brain Project; by a grant from the National Institute of Aging as part of the NSF/NIH (National Institutes of Health) Collaborative Research in Computational Neuroscience program; and by a contract from the National Institute of Drug Abuse under the Neuroscience Blueprint initiative.

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  1. the Krasnow Institute for Advanced Study and the Psychology Department, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia, 22030, USA

    Giorgio A. Ascoli

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FURTHER INFORMATION

Brain architecture management system

Braininfo

BrainML

Cell Centered Database

Computational Neuroanatomy Group

Cvapp

GENESIS

L-Measure

Neuronal Morphology Inventory

Neuron_morpho

NEURON

SenseLab

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Ascoli, G. Mobilizing the base of neuroscience data: the case of neuronal morphologies. Nat Rev Neurosci 7, 318–324 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn1885

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