Imaging high-frequency voltage dynamics in multiple neuron classes of behaving mammals

Abstract

Fluorescent genetically encoded voltage indicators report transmembrane potentials of targeted cell-types. However, voltage-imaging instrumentation has lacked the sensitivity to track spontaneous or evoked high-frequency voltage oscillations in neural populations. Here we describe two complementary TEMPO voltage-sensing technologies that capture neural oscillations up to [~]100 Hz. Fiber-optic TEMPO achieves [~]10-fold greater sensitivity than prior photometry systems, allows hour-long recordings, and monitors two neuron-classes per fiber-optic probe in freely moving mice. With it, we uncovered cross-frequency-coupled theta- and gamma-range oscillations and characterized excitatory-inhibitory neural dynamics during hippocampal ripples and visual cortical processing. The TEMPO mesoscope images voltage activity in two cell-classes across a [~]8-mm-wide field-of-view in head-fixed animals. In awake mice, it revealed sensory-evoked excitatory-inhibitory neural interactions and traveling gamma and 3-7 Hz waves in the visual cortex, and previously unreported propagation directions for hippocampal theta and beta waves. These technologies have widespread applications probing diverse oscillations and neuron-type interactions in healthy and diseased brains.