Morphoelectric properties of inhibitory neurons shift gradually and regardless of cell type along the depth of the cerebral cortex

• We quantify morphological and electrophysiological properties of inhibitory neurons across cortical depth.

• These properties shift gradually regardless of cell type in rat barrel cortex, mouse visual and motor cortex, and human middle temporal gyrus.

• Simple morphoelectric relationships distinguish the four main molecular cell types at any depth.

• This reveals two sources of diversity:

  1. intrinsic developmental programs (i.e., cell type-specific and depth-independent), and
  2. extrinsic environmental modulation (i.e., depth-dependent and cell type-independent).

Setup

To run the code, you need to clone and install this repository locally, e.g., in the command line, run:

git clone https://github.com/inhibicion/decoupling.git
cd decoupling
pip install -e .

Running Analyses

All scripts are in the notebooks/ folder:

• analysis1_morphoelectric_diversity.ipynb – Characterization of inhibitory neurons across cortical depth.
• analysis2_depth-dependent_gradients.ipynb – Gradual shifts of morphoelectric properties along cortical depth.
• analysis3_link_to_molecular_identity.ipynb – Depth-dependent variations reveal the molecular identity of inhibitory neurons.
• analysis4_preservation_across_areas_and_species.ipynb – Generalization across cortical areas and species.

Attribution

If you use decoupling consider citing our manuscript.

@article{YanezEtAl_Decoupling,
    title   = {Morphoelectric properties of inhibitory neurons shift gradually and regardless of cell type along the depth of the cerebral cortex}, 
    author  = {Felipe Yáñez and Fernando Messore and Guanxiao Qi and Nima Dehghani and Hanno S. Meyer and Dirk Feldmeyer and Bert Sakmann and Marcel Oberlaender},
    journal = {bioRxiv},
    year    = {2026},
	doi     = {10.64898/2026.03.05.709819},
	URL     = {https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.03.05.709819}
}