Sandeep Kumar, PhD
Postdoctoral AssociateAbout
Research
Publications
2026
Uncovering Sex Differences in the Drosophila Ventral Nerve Cord Through Connectome Alignment.
Matsliah A, Salmon CK, Bates AS, Yang HH, Lee DD, Saul LK, Silverman B, Gager J, Yu SC, Willie KP, Burke AT, Willie R, Bland D, Sorek M, David C, Sterling AR, BANC-FlyWire Consortium, Lee WA, Seung HS, Murthy M. Uncovering Sex Differences in the Drosophila Ventral Nerve Cord Through Connectome Alignment. BioRxiv 2026 PMID: 42367857, DOI: 10.64898/2026.06.14.732053.Peer-Reviewed Original ResearchDistributed control circuits across a brain-and-cord connectome
Bates A, Phelps J, Kim M, Yang H, Matsliah A, Ajabi Z, Perlman E, Delgado K, Osman M, Salmon C, Gager J, Silverman B, Renauld S, Salman F, Patel J, Collie M, Fan J, Pacheco D, Zhao Y, Zhang W, Capdevila L, Roberts R, Munnelly E, Griggs N, Langley H, Moya-Llamas B, Zhang Z, Maloney R, Yu S, Sterling A, Sorek M, Kruk K, Serafetinidis N, Dhawan S, Klemm F, Brooks P, Lesser E, Jones J, Pierce-Lundgren S, Lee S, Luo Y, Cook A, McKim T, Giakoumas D, Gorko B, Ellis-Joyce J, Zhang J, Kophs E, Falt T, Negron-Morales A, Burke A, Hebditch J, Willie K, Willie R, Popovych S, Kemnitz N, Ih D, Lee K, Lu R, Halageri A, Bae J, Jourdan B, Schwartzman G, Demarest D, Behnke E, Bland D, Kristiansen A, Skelton J, Stocks T, Garner D, Hernandez A, Kumar S, Daly K, Dorkenwald S, Collman F, Suver M, Fenk L, Pankratz M, Yao Z, Wang F, Huston S, Stürner T, Jefferis G, Eichler K, Seeds A, Hampel S, Agrawal S, Okubo T, Zandawala M, Macrina T, Adjavon D, Funke J, Tuthill J, Azevedo A, Seung H, de Bivort B, Murthy M, Drugowitsch J, Wilson R, Lee W. Distributed control circuits across a brain-and-cord connectome. Nature 2026, 1-4. PMID: 42259917, DOI: 10.1038/s41586-026-10735-w.Peer-Reviewed Original ResearchSynaptic and neural pathway redundancy enables the robustness of a sensory-motor reflex and promotes predation escape in Caenorhabditis elegans
He H, Fong E, Kumar S, Lee H, Leifer A, Chalfie M, Zheng C. Synaptic and neural pathway redundancy enables the robustness of a sensory-motor reflex and promotes predation escape in Caenorhabditis elegans. Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences Of The United States Of America 2026, 123: e2531407123. PMID: 42190007, PMCID: PMC13229336, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2531407123.Peer-Reviewed Original ResearchConceptsCaenorhabditis elegansMolecular basisGenetic redundancyGenetic perturbationsCaenorhabditis elegansPathway redundancyPredator escapeDevelopmental remodelingTouch response circuitCaenorhabditisSensory-motor reflexesTouch assayResponse circuitMolecular levelPredatorsSensory neuronsReflex circuitsAdditive mannerNervous systemPathwayNeuronal connectivityNeural pathwaysInterneuronsElegansSynapticallyExperience-Dependent Gain Modulation Drives Thermosensory Responses in Behavior.
García MD, Beagan J, Cabezas-Bou E, Thomas MJ, Kumar S, Shao L, Fu X, Cuentas-Condori A, McVay JR, Hawk JD, Lauziere A, Mohler W, Shroff H, Clark D, Colón-Ramos DA. Experience-Dependent Gain Modulation Drives Thermosensory Responses in Behavior. BioRxiv 2026 PMID: 42182155, DOI: 10.64898/2026.05.12.724589.Peer-Reviewed Original Research
2025
Programmed Cell Death Modifies Neural Circuits and Tunes Intrinsic Behavior
Kochersberger, Alison, et al. "Programmed Cell Death Modifies Neural Circuits and Tunes Intrinsic Behavior." bioRxiv (2025).Peer-Reviewed Original ResearchFunctional probing of neuronal subtypes via intersectional expression of optogenetic actuators reveals non-linear components in a linear circuit
Li T, Kumar S, Poon H, Leifer A, Zheng C. Functional probing of neuronal subtypes via intersectional expression of optogenetic actuators reveals non-linear components in a linear circuit. Cell Reports 2025, 44: 116327. PMID: 40975868, DOI: 10.1016/j.celrep.2025.116327.Peer-Reviewed Original ResearchDecoding sexual dimorphism of the sex-shared nervous system at single-neuron resolution
Haque R, Setty H, Lorenzo R, Stelzer G, Rotkopf R, Salzberg Y, Goldman G, Kumar S, Halber S, Leifer A, Schneidman E, Laurent P, Oren-Suissa M. Decoding sexual dimorphism of the sex-shared nervous system at single-neuron resolution. Science Advances 2025, 11: eadv9106. PMID: 40644535, PMCID: PMC12248294, DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adv9106.Peer-Reviewed Original ResearchConceptsSex-biased expressionSex-specific behaviorsSex-shared nervous systemSex-shared neuronsSex-specific genesSignaling-related genesExpression of neurotransmitter-related genesNeurotransmitter-related genesRegulatory candidatesFunctional dimorphismNeuronal wiringNeurotransmitter identitySexual dimorphismGenesRegulatory differencesDimorphismNervous systemNeuron-typeMolecular frameworkMolecular compositionSex shapesMolecular architectureHermaphroditesSynaptic wiringTranscriptomeNeural mechanisms of predictive processing: a collaborative community experiment through the OpenScope program
Aizenbud, Ido, et al. "Neural mechanisms of predictive processing: a collaborative community experiment through the OpenScope program." arXiv preprint arXiv:2504.09614 (2025).Peer-Reviewed Original Research
2024
Hierarchical behavior control by a single class of interneurons
Huo J, Xu T, Liu Q, Polat M, Kumar S, Zhang X, Leifer A, Wen Q. Hierarchical behavior control by a single class of interneurons. Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences Of The United States Of America 2024, 121: e2410789121. PMID: 39531495, PMCID: PMC11588054, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2410789121.Peer-Reviewed Original ResearchNeuronal wiring diagram of an adult brain.
Dorkenwald S, Matsliah A, Sterling AR, Schlegel P, Yu SC, McKellar CE, Lin A, Costa M, Eichler K, Yin Y, Silversmith W, Schneider-Mizell C, Jordan CS, Brittain D, Halageri A, Kuehner K, Ogedengbe O, Morey R, Gager J, Kruk K, Perlman E, Yang R, Deutsch D, Bland D, Sorek M, Lu R, Macrina T, Lee K, Bae JA, Mu S, Nehoran B, Mitchell E, Popovych S, Wu J, Jia Z, Castro MA, Kemnitz N, Ih D, Bates AS, Eckstein N, Funke J, Collman F, Bock DD, Jefferis GSXE, Seung HS, Murthy M, FlyWire Consortium. Neuronal wiring diagram of an adult brain. Nature 2024, 634: 124-138. PMID: 39358518, DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07558-y.Peer-Reviewed Original Research