# Topics and Trends in Most Cited Neurobiology and Insect Physiology Research Papers, Class of 2026

*Canonical URL: https://pri.pepkio.com/top-papers/neurobiology-and-insect-physiology-research/2026*

## What topics and trends defined most-cited Neurobiology and Insect Physiology Research research in the Class of 2026?

The Class of 2026 in insect neurobiology is anchored by whole-brain connectomics and synaptic connectivity, with Drosophila melanogaster remaining the primary model organism. Whole-brain connectomics and descending motor neurons surged sharply, while single-cell receptor recording and classical neurotransmitter signaling topics experienced relative declines.

## At a glance

| Fact | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Field | Neurobiology and Insect Physiology Research |
| Cohort label | Class of 2026 (2024 publications) |
| Papers analyzed | 3,912 |
| Papers ranked | 20 |
| Top topics in ranked papers | Connectome, synaptic connectivity, courtship behavior, descending neurons, chemosensory processing |
| Publication window | Jan 1, 2024 – Dec 31, 2024 |
| Eligibility | Research articles; reviews excluded |
| Citation window | 18 months post-publication |
| 18m citation range | 38–400 |
| Data source | OpenAlex · Retrieved Jul 2026 |
| License | CC BY 4.0 |

## Rankings

| Rank | Title | Authors | Corresponding authors | Affiliation | Journal | 18m citations | DOI |
| ---: | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | ---: | --- |
| 1 | Neuronal wiring diagram of an adult brain | Sven Dorkenwald, Arie Matsliah, Amy R Sterling, Philipp Schlegel, Szi-Chieh Yu, Claire E McKellar, Albert Lin, Marta Costa, Katharina Eichler, Yijie Yin, Will Silversmith, Casey Schneider-Mizell, Chris S Jordan, Derrick Brittain, Akhilesh Halageri, Kai Kuehner, Oluwaseun Ogedengbe, Ryan Morey, Jay Gager, Krzysztof Kruk, Eric Perlman, Runzhe Yang, David Deutsch, Doug Bland, Marissa Sorek, Ran Lu, Thomas Macrina, Kisuk Lee, J Alexander Bae, Shang Mu, Barak Nehoran, Eric Mitchell, Sergiy Popovych, Jingpeng Wu, Zhen Jia, Manuel A Castro, Nico Kemnitz, Dodam Ih, Alexander Shakeel Bates, Nils Eckstein, Jan Funke, Forrest Collman, Davi D Bock, Gregory S X E Jefferis, H Sebastian Seung, Mala Murthy, FlyWire Consortium | H. Sebastian Seung, Mala Murthy | Princeton University, United States | Nature | 400 | 10.1038/s41586-024-07558-y |
| 2 | Whole-brain annotation and multi-connectome cell typing of Drosophila | Philipp Schlegel, Yijie Yin, Alexander S Bates, Sven Dorkenwald, Katharina Eichler, Paul Brooks, Daniel S Han, Marina Gkantia, Marcia Dos Santos, Eva J Munnelly, Griffin Badalamente, Laia Serratosa Capdevila, Varun A Sane, Alexandra M C Fragniere, Ladann Kiassat, Markus W Pleijzier, Tomke Stürner, Imaan F M Tamimi, Christopher R Dunne, Irene Salgarella, Alexandre Javier, Siqi Fang, Eric Perlman, Tom Kazimiers, Sridhar R Jagannathan, Arie Matsliah, Amy R Sterling, Szi-Chieh Yu, Claire E McKellar, FlyWire Consortium, Marta Costa, H Sebastian Seung, Mala Murthy, Volker Hartenstein, Davi D Bock, Gregory S X E Jefferis | Philipp Schlegel | MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, United Kingdom | Nature | 301 | 10.1038/s41586-024-07686-5 |
| 3 | Keypoint-MoSeq: parsing behavior by linking point tracking to pose dynamics | Caleb Weinreb, Jonah E Pearl, Sherry Lin, Mohammed Abdal Monium Osman, Libby Zhang, Sidharth Annapragada, Eli Conlin, Red Hoffmann, Sofia Makowska, Winthrop F Gillis, Maya Jay, Shaokai Ye, Alexander Mathis, Mackenzie W Mathis, Talmo Pereira, Scott W Linderman, Sandeep Robert Datta | Scott W. Linderman, Sandeep Robert Datta | Harvard Medical School, United States | Nature Methods | 129 | 10.1038/s41592-024-02318-2 |
| 4 | Neurotransmitter classification from electron microscopy images at synaptic sites in Drosophila melanogaster | Nils Eckstein, Alexander Shakeel Bates, Andrew Champion, Michelle Du, Yijie Yin, Philipp Schlegel, Alicia Kun-Yang Lu, Thomson Rymer, Samantha Finley-May, Tyler Paterson, Ruchi Parekh, Sven Dorkenwald, Arie Matsliah, Szi-Chieh Yu, Claire McKellar, Amy Sterling, Katharina Eichler, Marta Costa, Sebastian Seung, Mala Murthy, Volker Hartenstein, Gregory S X E Jefferis, Jan Funke | Gregory S.X.E. Jefferis, Jan Funke | HHMI Janelia Research Campus, United States | Cell | 120 | 10.1016/j.cell.2024.03.016 |
| 5 | Network statistics of the whole-brain connectome of Drosophila | Albert Lin, Runzhe Yang, Sven Dorkenwald, Arie Matsliah, Amy R Sterling, Philipp Schlegel, Szi-Chieh Yu, Claire E McKellar, Marta Costa, Katharina Eichler, Alexander Shakeel Bates, Nils Eckstein, Jan Funke, Gregory S X E Jefferis, Mala Murthy | Mala Murthy | Princeton University, United States | Nature | 89 | 10.1038/s41586-024-07968-y |
| 6 | Structural basis for odorant recognition of the insect odorant receptor OR-Orco heterocomplex | Yidong Wang, Liang Qiu, Bing Wang, Zeyuan Guan, Zhi Dong, Jie Zhang, Song Cao, Lulu Yang, Bo Wang, Zhou Gong, Liwei Zhang, Weihua Ma, Zhu Liu, Delin Zhang, Guirong Wang, Ping Yin | Yidong Wang, Liang Qiu, Bing Wang, Bo Wang | Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, China | Science | 84 | 10.1126/science.adn6881 |
| 7 | Structural basis of odor sensing by insect heteromeric odorant receptors | Jiawei Zhao, Andy Q Chen, Jaewook Ryu, Josefina Del Mármol | Josefina del Mármol | Harvard Medical School, United States | Science | 76 | 10.1126/science.adn6384 |
| 8 | Connectomic reconstruction of a female Drosophila ventral nerve cord | Anthony Azevedo, Ellen Lesser, Jasper S Phelps, Brandon Mark, Leila Elabbady, Sumiya Kuroda, Anne Sustar, Anthony Moussa, Avinash Khandelwal, Chris J Dallmann, Sweta Agrawal, Su-Yee J Lee, Brandon Pratt, Andrew Cook, Kyobi Skutt-Kakaria, Stephan Gerhard, Ran Lu, Nico Kemnitz, Kisuk Lee, Akhilesh Halageri, Manuel Castro, Dodam Ih, Jay Gager, Marwan Tammam, Sven Dorkenwald, Forrest Collman, Casey Schneider-Mizell, Derrick Brittain, Chris S Jordan, Michael Dickinson, Alexandra Pacureanu, H Sebastian Seung, Thomas Macrina, Wei-Chung Allen Lee, John C Tuthill | Wei-Chung Allen Lee | University of Washington, United States | Nature | 76 | 10.1038/s41586-024-07389-x |
| 9 | Connectome-constrained networks predict neural activity across the fly visual system | Janne K Lappalainen, Fabian D Tschopp, Sridhama Prakhya, Mason McGill, Aljoscha Nern, Kazunori Shinomiya, Shin-Ya Takemura, Eyal Gruntman, Jakob H Macke, Srinivas C Turaga | Srinivas C. Turaga | Tübingen University, Germany | Nature | 74 | 10.1038/s41586-024-07939-3 |
| 10 | Synaptic connectome of the Drosophila circadian clock | Nils Reinhard, Ayumi Fukuda, Giulia Manoli, Emilia Derksen, Aika Saito, Gabriel Möller, Manabu Sekiguchi, Dirk Rieger, Charlotte Helfrich-Förster, Taishi Yoshii, Meet Zandawala | Charlotte Helfrich‐Förster, Meet Zandawala | Julius-Maximilians-University of Würzburg, Germany | Nature Communications | 74 | 10.1038/s41467-024-54694-0 |
| 11 | A Drosophila computational brain model reveals sensorimotor processing | Philip K Shiu, Gabriella R Sterne, Nico Spiller, Romain Franconville, Andrea Sandoval, Joie Zhou, Neha Simha, Chan Hyuk Kang, Seongbong Yu, Jinseop S Kim, Sven Dorkenwald, Arie Matsliah, Philipp Schlegel, Szi-Chieh Yu, Claire E McKellar, Amy Sterling, Marta Costa, Katharina Eichler, Alexander Shakeel Bates, Nils Eckstein, Jan Funke, Gregory S X E Jefferis, Mala Murthy, Salil S Bidaye, Stefanie Hampel, Andrew M Seeds, Kristin Scott | Philip K. Shiu | University of California, Berkeley, United States | Nature | 63 | 10.1038/s41586-024-07763-9 |
| 12 | Neuronal parts list and wiring diagram for a visual system | Arie Matsliah, Szi-Chieh Yu, Krzysztof Kruk, Doug Bland, Austin T Burke, Jay Gager, James Hebditch, Ben Silverman, Kyle Patrick Willie, Ryan Willie, Marissa Sorek, Amy R Sterling, Emil Kind, Dustin Garner, Gizem Sancer, Mathias F Wernet, Sung Soo Kim, Mala Murthy, H Sebastian Seung, FlyWire Consortium | Mala Murthy, H. Sebastian Seung | Princeton University, United States | Nature | 61 | 10.1038/s41586-024-07981-1 |
| 13 | Converting an allocentric goal into an egocentric steering signal | Peter Mussells Pires, Lingwei Zhang, Victoria Parache, L F Abbott, Gaby Maimon | Gaby Maimon | The Rockefeller University, United States | Nature | 50 | 10.1038/s41586-023-07006-3 |
| 14 | Why flying insects gather at artificial light | Samuel T Fabian, Yash Sondhi, Pablo E Allen, Jamie C Theobald, Huai-Ti Lin | Samuel T. Fabian, Yash Sondhi | Imperial College London, United Kingdom | Nature Communications | 50 | 10.1038/s41467-024-44785-3 |
| 15 | Synaptic architecture of leg and wing premotor control networks in Drosophila | Ellen Lesser, Anthony W Azevedo, Jasper S Phelps, Leila Elabbady, Andrew Cook, Durafshan Sakeena Syed, Brandon Mark, Sumiya Kuroda, Anne Sustar, Anthony Moussa, Chris J Dallmann, Sweta Agrawal, Su-Yee J Lee, Brandon Pratt, Kyobi Skutt-Kakaria, Stephan Gerhard, Ran Lu, Nico Kemnitz, Kisuk Lee, Akhilesh Halageri, Manuel Castro, Dodam Ih, Jay Gager, Marwan Tammam, Sven Dorkenwald, Forrest Collman, Casey Schneider-Mizell, Derrick Brittain, Chris S Jordan, Thomas Macrina, Michael Dickinson, Wei-Chung Allen Lee, John C Tuthill | Wei-Chung Allen Lee | University of Washington, United States | Nature | 42 | 10.1038/s41586-024-07600-z |
| 16 | Structural basis for sugar perception by <i>Drosophila</i> gustatory receptors | Demin Ma, Meiqin Hu, Xiaotong Yang, Qiang Liu, Fan Ye, Weijie Cai, Yong Wang, Ximing Xu, Shenghai Chang, Ruiying Wang, Wei Yang, Sheng Ye, Nannan Su, Minrui Fan, Haoxing Xu, Jiangtao Guo | Demin Ma, Meiqin Hu, Xiaotong Yang, Qiang Liu, Nannan Su, Minrui Fan, Haoxing Xu, Jiangtao Guo | Zhejiang University, China | Science | 41 | 10.1126/science.adj2609 |
| 17 | miR-276 and miR-182013-5p modulate insect metamorphosis and reproduction via dually regulating juvenile hormone acid methyltransferase | Jiasheng Song, Wanwan Li, Lulu Gao, Qiang Yan, Xinyan Zhang, Mingzhi Liu, Shutang Zhou | Shutang Zhou | Henan University, China | Communications Biology | 41 | 10.1038/s42003-024-07285-0 |
| 18 | Thermal infrared directs host-seeking behaviour in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes | Avinash Chandel, Nicolas A DeBeaubien, Anindya Ganguly, Geoff T Meyerhof, Andreas A Krumholz, Jiangqu Liu, Vincent L Salgado, Craig Montell | Craig Montell | University of California, Santa Barbara, United States | Nature | 40 | 10.1038/s41586-024-07848-5 |
| 19 | Engineered odorant receptors illuminate the basis of odour discrimination | Claire A de March, Ning Ma, Christian B Billesbølle, Jeevan Tewari, Claudia Llinas Del Torrent, Wijnand J C van der Velden, Ichie Ojiro, Ikumi Takayama, Bryan Faust, Linus Li, Nagarajan Vaidehi, Aashish Manglik, Hiroaki Matsunami | Claire A. de March, Nagarajan Vaidehi, Aashish Manglik, Hiroaki Matsunami | Duke University, United States | Nature | 40 | 10.1038/s41586-024-08126-0 |
| 20 | Common principles for odour coding across vertebrates and invertebrates | Kara A Fulton, David Zimmerman, Aravi Samuel, Katrin Vogt, Sandeep Robert Datta | Katrin Vogt, Sandeep Robert Datta | Harvard Medical School, United States | Nature reviews. Neuroscience | 38 | 10.1038/s41583-024-00822-0 |

## Topic trends

### What Topics Define the Class of 2026?

The Class of 2026 in insect neurobiology and physiology is dominated by whole-brain structural and functional mapping. Drosophila melanogaster remains the foundational model organism for genetic and optical manipulation, featured in 36% of top-ranked publications in this field. The primary intellectual engine driving recent progress is circuit-level connectomics, highlighted by the prominent representation of Connectome (32% of papers) and Synaptic connectivity (30%). Neural circuit analyses increasingly target complex innate behaviors, led by Courtship behavior (14%), Descending neurons (12%), and Sensorimotor integration (8%). Secondary research clusters focus on sensory processing and neurophysiology, including Chemosensory processing (10%), Olfactory receptors (10%), Feeding behavior (8%), Motor neurons (8%), and biophysical channel opening dynamics (8%). Emerging work integrates FlyWire connectomic datasets with computational neural network modeling, gut-brain axis communication, and cryo-EM structures of membrane receptors. Together, these thematic topics demonstrate that modern insect physiology research has transitioned from isolated single-neuron recordings into an era of brain-wide synaptic connectomics, descending motor control architecture, and high-resolution structural neurobiology.

*Leading research themes*

### How Did Topics Shift from the Class of 2025 to the Class of 2026?

Comparing the Class of 2025 and Class of 2026 reveals a dramatic reallocation of research focus toward circuit-scale reconstruction and motor command control. Connectome emerged as the top rising concept, expanding from 14% of papers in 2023 (7 papers) to 32% in 2024 (16 papers, representing a +18 percentage point gain and 2.29-fold increase). Synaptic connectivity grew from 18% to 30% (+12 percentage points), while Descending neurons surged sixfold from 2% to 12% (1 to 6 papers). Breakthrough topics appearing for the first time in 2024 include ion channel opening (8%), FlyWire connectome resources (6%), cryo-EM structure determination (6%), Gustatory receptors (6%), and Neuroendocrine cells (6%). In contrast, single-cell functional profiling and traditional neurotransmitter signaling saw relative declines: Olfactory receptor neurons decreased from 10% to 4%, while Cholinergic signaling and Dopaminergic signaling each dropped from 8% to 4%. Motor neurons remained stable at 8%. These shifts reflect a field-wide transition toward structural circuit mapping and brain-wide descending motor control.

*How topics shifted year over year*

## Cite this ranking

```
Pepkio Research Index (PRI). Topics and Trends in Most Cited Neurobiology and Insect Physiology Research Papers, Class of 2026. https://pri.pepkio.com/top-papers/neurobiology-and-insect-physiology-research/2026. Accessed 2026-07-21.

Zheng Su, Tinsley Li, Thematic Shifts in Early-High-Impact Cancer Genomics and Diagnostics Research: A Bibliometric and Semantic Analysis. bioRxiv 2026.07.04.736459; doi: https://doi.org/10.64898/2026.07.04.736459
```