In the brain, there is a wide variety of cell types that undergo dynamic changes. Appropriate regulation of protein expression is essential for maintaining this cellular diversity and plasticity. Recent studies have increasingly shown that regulation at the translational level is particularly crucial for neural function. However, compared to transcriptional gene regulation, our understanding of translational control remains limited, making it a key area for future investigation. In this article, I discuss methods for genome-wide translational analyses, especially focusing on ribosome profiling—an approach that analyzes the positions of ribosomes on mRNAs. I also introduce recent research findings obtained using these techniques and discuss the translational regulations in the nervous system.

The ability to rapidly transform visual input into appropriate behavioral output is a fundamental trait shared by many animals. Among the various forms of visual information, optic flow—the global motion of the visual scene—plays a crucial role in stabilizing gaze and posture by guiding eye and body movements. This type of visuomotor control is widely conserved across vertebrates, and zebrafish larvae have emerged as a powerful model for studying the mechanisms. Optic flow can be broadly categorized into rotational and translational motion, which elicit the optokinetic and optomotor responses, respectively. These visual cues are detected by retinal ganglion cells and transmitted to the optic tectum and the pretectum. Notably, the pretectum plays a central role in mediating optic flow-dependent behaviors. Recent advances in calcium imaging and single-cell RNA sequencing have greatly enhanced our understanding of the neural circuits underlying these processes. In this review, I provide an overview of the neural circuits involved in optic flow processing in zebrafish and introduce a novel approach—CaMPARI-seq—which combines neuronal activity-dependent cell labeling with scRNA-seq to uncover the neural basis of visually guided behavior.