Axonal sprouting of dentate gyrus (DG) afferents after entorhinal cortex (EC) lesion is a model preparation to assess lesion-induced functional reorganization in a denervated target structure. Following a unilateral EC lesion, the surviving contralateral entorhinal projection, termed the crossed temporodentate pathway (CTD), and the heterotypic septal input to the DG, the septodentate pathway (SD), undergo extensive axonal sprouting. We explored whether EC lesion alters the capacity of the SD pathway to influence CTD-evoked granule cell excitability in the DG. We recorded extracellular field excitatory postsynaptic potentials (fEPSPs) after CTD stimulation alone and paired SD-CTD stimulation. Male rats were given unilateral EC lesions or sham operations; evoked fEPSPs in the DG were recorded at 4-, 15-, and 90-days post-entorhinal lesion to assess functional reorganization of the CTD and SD pathways. We found significantly increased fEPSP amplitudes in cases with unilateral lesions compared to sham-operates at 15- and 90-days post lesion. Within each time point, paired SD-CTD stimulation resulted in significantly depressed fEPSP amplitudes compared to amplitudes evoked after CTD stimulation alone and this effect was solely seen in cases with EC lesion. In cases where granule cell discharge was observed, SD stimulation increased discharge amplitude elicited by the CTD stimulation at 90-days postlesion. These findings demonstrate that synaptic remodeling following unilateral cortical lesion results in a synergistic interaction between two established hippocampal afferents that is not seen in uninjured brains. This work may be important for models of neurodegenerative disease and neural injury that target these structures and associated hippocampal circuitry.

The year 2021 marks the 30th Anniversary of the founding of the Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience (FUN). Within the first ten years of FUN's existence, the organization grew from a group of 67 individuals committed to undergraduate education in the neurosciences to over 300 members. FUN established productive partnerships with the Society for Neuroscience and the Association of Neuroscience Departments and Programs. FUN launched numerous projects to enhance the experience of undergraduates in the classroom and in the laboratory. FUN established a Travel Award Program that enabled undergraduates to attend the Annual Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience to present research posters on the floor of the meeting. Subsequently, undergraduate students were invited to present posters at the annual FUN Social. The listserv FUNnet was created to enable communication among FUN members. Workshops designed to enhance curricular development and laboratory-based experiences were begun in 1995 and continued every three years thereafter. Conversations to create regional conferences similar to the NorthEast Under/graduate Research Organization for Neuroscience (NEURON) conference were facilitated at the 2001 FUN Workshop. Efforts to improve National Institutes of Health funding for undergraduate colleges and universities were launched. Because of the dedication of FUN members, the first ten years of FUN's existence were filled with energetic innovations that significantly enhanced the education of undergraduate neuroscience students.

The dedication of undergraduate neuroscience faculty to their students could not have been more evident than what these educators demonstrated when the COVID-19 pandemic impacted colleges and universities across the United States. These faculty faced the crisis head-on to provide their students with exceptional instruction in virtual formats that many faculty had never used for instruction before the pandemic. This same tenacious attitude has been reflected in pedagogical efforts that undergraduate neuroscience faculty have undertaken since the mid-1990s. The challenges of providing cutting-edge neuroscience education to undergraduates in a dynamic field have produced a series of curricular designs and approaches that capitalize on discipline-based education research. This article reviews curricular models and pedagogical strategies aimed at enhancing the educational experiences of undergraduate neuroscience students whose lived experiences and academic backgrounds reflect the richly kaleidoscopic demographics of college students in the 21st century. The future of undergraduate neuroscience education is bright as faculty and their students collaborate on their journey of discovery in neuroscience.