@article{ShewaregaTroidlAlvaradoRodriguezetal.2025, author = {Shewarega, Michael and Troidl, Jakob and Alvarado Rodriguez, Oliver and Dindoost, Mohammad and Harth, Philipp and Haberkern, Hannah and Stegmaier, Johannes and Bader, David and Pfister, Hanspeter}, title = {MoMo - Combining Neuron Morphology and Connectivity for Interactive Motif Analysis in Connectomes}, journal = {IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics}, doi = {10.1109/TVCG.2025.3634808}, year = {2025}, abstract = {Connectomics, a subfield of neuroscience, reconstructs structural and functional brain maps at synapse-level resolution. These complex spatial maps consist of tree-like neurons interconnected by synapses. Motif analysis is a widely used method for identifying recurring subgraph patterns in connectomes. These motifs, thus, potentially represent fundamental units of information processing. However, existing computational tools often oversimplify neurons as mere nodes in a graph, disregarding their intricate morphologies. In this paper, we introduce MoMo, a novel interactive visualization framework for analyzing neuron morphology-aware motifs in large connectome graphs. First, we propose an advanced graph data structure that integrates both neuronal morphology and synaptic connectivity. This enables highly efficient, parallel subgraph isomorphism searches, allowing for interactive morphological motif queries. Second, we develop a sketch-based interface that facilitates the intuitive exploration of morphology-based motifs within our new data structure. Users can conduct interactive motif searches on state-of-the-art connectomes and visualize results as interactive 3D renderings. We present a detailed goal and task analysis for motif exploration in connectomes, incorporating neuron morphology. Finally, we evaluate MoMo through case studies with four domain experts, who asses the tool's usefulness and effectiveness in motif exploration, and relevance to real-world neuroscience research. The source code for MoMo is available here: https://github.com/VCG/momo.}, language = {en} } @article{PetkovaJanuszewskiBlakelyetal.2025, author = {Petkova, Mariela D. and Januszewski, MichaƂ and Blakely, Tim and Herrera, Kristian J. and Schuhknecht, Gregor F.P. and Tiller, Robert and Choi, Jinhan and Schalek, Richard L. and Boulanger-Weill, Jonathan and Peleg, Adi and Wu, Yuelong and Wang, Shuohong and Troidl, Jakob and Vohra, Sumit Kumar and Wei, Donglai and Lin, Zudi and Bahl, Armin and Tapia, Juan Carlos and Iyer, Nirmala and Miller, Zachary T. and Hebert, Kathryn B. and Pavarino, Elisa C. and Taylor, Milo and Deng, Zixuan and Stingl, Moritz and Hockling, Dana and Hebling, Alina and Wang, Ruohong C. and Zhang, Lauren L. and Dvorak, Sam and Faik, Zainab and King, Jr., Kareem I. and Goel, Pallavi and Wagner-Carena, Julian and Aley, David and Chalyshkan, Selimzhan and Contreas, Dominick and Li, Xiong and Muthukumar, Akila V. and Vernaglia, Marina S. and Carrasco, Teodoro Tapia and Melnychuck, Sofia and Yan, TingTing and Dalal, Ananya and DiMartino, James and Brown, Sam and Safo-Mensa, Nana and Greenberg, Ethan and Cook, Michael and Finley, Samantha and Flynn, Miriam A. and Hopkins, Gary Patrick and Kovalyak, Julie and Leonard, Meghan and Lohff, Alanna and Ordish, Christopher and Scott, Ashley L. and Takemura, Satoko and Smith, Claire and Walsh, John J. and Berger, Daniel R. and Pfister, Hanspeter and Berg, Stuart and Knecht, Christopher and Meissner, Geoffrey W. and Korff, Wyatt and Ahrens, Misha B and Jain, Viren and Lichtman, Jeff W. and Engert, Florian}, title = {A connectomic resource for neural cataloguing and circuit dissection of the larval zebrafish brain}, journal = {bioRxiv}, doi = {10.1101/2025.06.10.658982}, year = {2025}, abstract = {We present a correlated light and electron microscopy (CLEM) dataset from a 7-day-old larval zebrafish, integrating confocal imaging of genetically labeled excitatory (vglut2a) and inhibitory (gad1b) neurons with nanometer-resolution serial section EM. The dataset spans the brain and anterior spinal cord, capturing >180,000 segmented soma, >40,000 molecularly annotated neurons, and 30 million synapses, most of which were classified as excitatory, inhibitory, or modulatory. To characterize the directional flow of activity across the brain, we leverage the synaptic and cell body annotations to compute region-wise input and output drive indices at single cell resolution. We illustrate the dataset's utility by dissecting and validating circuits in three distinct systems: water flow direction encoding in the lateral line, recurrent excitation and contralateral inhibition in a hindbrain motion integrator, and functionally relevant targeted long-range projections from a tegmental excitatory nucleus, demonstrating that this resource enables rigorous hypothesis testing as well as exploratory-driven circuit analysis. The dataset is integrated into an open-access platform optimized to facilitate community reconstruction and discovery efforts throughout the larval zebrafish brain.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{HarthBastTroidletal.2023, author = {Harth, Philipp and Bast, Arco and Troidl, Jakob and Meulemeester, Bjorge and Pfister, Hanspeter and Beyer, Johanna and Oberlaender, Marcel and Hege, Hans-Christian and Baum, Daniel}, title = {Rapid Prototyping for Coordinated Views of Multi-scale Spatial and Abstract Data: A Grammar-based Approach}, booktitle = {Eurographics Workshop on Visual Computing for Biology and Medicine (VCBM)}, doi = {10.2312/vcbm.20231218}, year = {2023}, abstract = {Visualization grammars are gaining popularity as they allow visualization specialists and experienced users to quickly create static and interactive views. Existing grammars, however, mostly focus on abstract views, ignoring three-dimensional (3D) views, which are very important in fields such as natural sciences. We propose a generalized interaction grammar for the problem of coordinating heterogeneous view types, such as standard charts (e.g., based on Vega-Lite) and 3D anatomical views. An important aspect of our web-based framework is that user interactions with data items at various levels of detail can be systematically integrated and used to control the overall layout of the application workspace. With the help of a concise JSON-based specification of the intended workflow, we can handle complex interactive visual analysis scenarios. This enables rapid prototyping and iterative refinement of the visual analysis tool in collaboration with domain experts. We illustrate the usefulness of our framework in two real-world case studies from the field of neuroscience. Since the logic of the presented grammar-based approach for handling interactions between heterogeneous web-based views is free of any application specifics, it can also serve as a template for applications beyond biological research.}, language = {en} } @incollection{PfisterKaynigBothaetal.2014, author = {Pfister, Hanspeter and Kaynig, Verena and Botha, Charl P. and Bruckner, Stefan and Dercksen, Vincent J. and Hege, Hans-Christian and Roerdink, Jos B.T.M.}, title = {Visualization in Connectomics}, booktitle = {Scientific Visualization - Uncertainty, Multifield, Biomedical, and Scalable Visualization}, editor = {Hansen, Charles D. and Chen, Min and Johnson, Christopher R. and Kaufman, Arie E. and Hagen, Hans}, publisher = {Springer}, isbn = {978-1-4471-6496-8}, arxiv = {http://arxiv.org/abs/1206.1428}, doi = {10.1007/978-1-4471-6497-5_21}, pages = {221 -- 245}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Connectomics is a branch of neuroscience that attempts to create a connectome, i.e., a complete map of the neuronal system and all connections between neuronal structures. This representation can be used to understand how functional brain states emerge from their underlying anatomical structures and how dysfunction and neuronal diseases arise. We review the current state-of-the-art of visualization and image processing techniques in the field of connectomics and describe a number of challenges. After a brief summary of the biological background and an overview of relevant imaging modalities, we review current techniques to extract connectivity information from image data at macro-, meso- and microscales. We also discuss data integration and neural network modeling, as well as the visualization, analysis and comparison of brain networks.}, language = {en} } @misc{PfisterKaynigBothaetal.2012, author = {Pfister, Hanspeter and Kaynig, Verena and Botha, Charl and Bruckner, Stefan and Dercksen, Vincent J. and Hege, Hans-Christian and Roerdink, Jos}, title = {Visualization in Connectomics}, arxiv = {http://arxiv.org/abs/1206.1428}, doi = {10.1007/978-1-4471-6497-5_21}, year = {2012}, language = {en} }