user_scenarios

User stories

The aim of this document is to outline realistic scenarios for users of VFB and to assess the extent to which the site lets them achieve their aims.

Scenario 1:

A researcher has found a neuron with terminals in some poorly mapped part of the brain that she hypothesises might function in perception of auditory signals. She wants to know:

1. What is this region of the brain called? Solution: Double click on the Brain region in the stack browser.

2. Is anything known about this neuron:

• From the literature?
  • Solution: query for neurons with some part in this region
  • Problems: There may be many neurons with parts in the region. The results list doesn't provide thumbnails (even when these are available). So a user has to check each neuron individually. If no images are available on the term info page for the neuron, she has to download the original papers to check.
  • Suggested improvements:
    • Display thumbnail images in results lists when querying for neurons/anatomical structures.
    • Make the collection and assignment of images to neurons a high priority for data collection.
• From bulk data?
  • Solutions:
    • query for images of neurons with some part in this region, clustered by shape. This has the advantage that the report is quite short, due to clustering, and comes with nice clear thumbnail images. Clusters can be further explored as 3D rotatable webGL. Members of clusters can easily be viewed, and these come with classification (if present - coverage is currently patchy). Any individual neuron can be viewed on the stack browser, in combination with other neurons or transgene images if needed.
    • Query for images of neurons with some part in this region, unclustered. This has the disadvantage that the list is long, but the advantage that it is more comprehensive. All results come with thumbnails and typing, if known.
    • Problems: Very limited mapping of neuron images to types outside of outside of antennal lobe neurons.
    • Suggested improvements: Make mapping of neurons to types a priority. Some of these could be done quite trivially with a bit of effort. Many could potentially be crowdsourced from the community.

3. Do any known transgenes drive expression in this neuron?

   • Solutions:
     • If the neuron is among published classes, a single click lists transgenes known to be expressed in this neuron.
     • Search for transgenes with some parts in this region. Results include images where available. These are linked to their source and can be viewed on the stack browser - in combination with single neuron iamges if need be.

4. Can I find potential circuit partners for this neuron?

• From the literature

  • Solutions:
    • query for neurons with some part in this region
    • Query for neurons with synaptic terminals in this region
    • Query for neurons with presynaptic terminals in this region
    • Query for neurons with postsynaptic terminals in this region
    • Search for a suitable functional classification - in this case 'auditory system neuron'. In this case, some images of subclasses are available. Then search for subclasses
      • Problems for this solution: Not necessarily obvious to users how to do this (although autocomplete means that typing 'auditory' is sufficient.
    • Problems for all these solutions: None of the results lists come with images.

• From bulk data?

  • Solution: Search for neuron images - as above.