What is it about?
We found a small group of brain cells in mice that acts very differently in males and females. This cell cluster, called DIMPLE, is always active in females, no matter their age or experience. In males, it is usually not active, but this can change depending on their social status: it is active before puberty during the nursing stage and in adulthood after a male has just mated. Furthermore, we highlight potential hormonal mediators that may affect DIMPLE activity.
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Photo by Bhautik Patel on Unsplash
Why is it important?
There are very few examples of brain areas that show clear, binary differences between the sexes, like the genitalia do. Here, we identify such an area in the medial amygdala, which regulates social and sexual behavior. These anatomical differences may provide important clues about how sex-specific brain features contribute to behavioral differences between males and females.
Perspectives
We discovered this cluster incidentally while searching for other activity-dependent brain changes. This suggests that important findings can emerge when researchers look beyond their original targets and avoid searching only “under the lamp.”
Tamar Licht
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: A sexually dimorphic neuronal cluster in the mouse medial amygdala responds to male sexual status, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, January 2026, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2518703123.
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