2017

Imaging calcium (Ca2+)-dependent neuronal activity with a head mounted miniaturized microscope is a revolutionary technique to study the brain in action. This incredible technology empowers neuroscientists across the world to decipher how hundreds of brain cells respond under healthy conditions and in diseased states. Since this method is relatively new and unique in its ability

Opsins are transmembrane proteins and a fundamental component of the optogenetic toolkit. As optogenetics actuators, opsins modify the activity of cells in which they are expressed when exposed to light and can induce single to multiple action potentials or inhibit neural activity with millisecond precision. Opsins can be categorized into two main classes: microbial opsins

Addiction is surging in the United States. We’re all aware of the current news on the opioid crisis, and at least one in every 10 American adult is addicted to drugs or alcohol. Though the specific reasons for addiction must vary with the person, there are universal features, like the way we learn to associate

We perused the journals for neural circuit research papers so all you have to do is click on the link below, if a paper interests you. The month of May started out slow for neural circuit papers, but ended up with a plethora of papers to read ranging from a circuit for sleep, memory, vocal

When I applied to graduate school in neuroscience back in the day, most of my cohort didn’t quite know which lab they wanted to join, but I was crystal clear about Richard Mooney’s birdsong lab at Duke University. I totally had a science crush. Ultimately, I didn’t get into Duke, yet I’ve remained a fan

I first began studying neural circuits in Ed Callaway’s lab at the Salk Institute, even before his group was doing viral tracing studies. To map functional circuits, we used electrophysiology of 1-2 neurons and glutamate uncaging with UV light, or photostimulation. Now photostimulation has transformed into optogenetics and neuroscientists have the ability to record from

In the next video of our Neurovox series, we feature Kip Ludwig, PhD, Associate Director, Mayo Neural Engineering Laboratories. Kip runs a research lab in bioelectronic medicines which are small, wireless implantable devices to interface with the nervous system to manipulate organ function. These devices have proved instrumental in improving conditions such as Parkinson’s Disease.

Bloomberg visited Inscopix laboratories and made this fantastic video of our miniature microscope technology. Check out how our technology reads brain activity in real time at single-cell resolution for a thousand neurons at a time in mice!

We asked seven neuroscience experts for their advice to anyone desiring to make their mark, either at the research bench or outside of academia. Much of what they said applies to any professional endeavor. Below we included the direct quotes from our interviews. Communicate across fields. “Your impact is going to be predicated on your

When we visit a friend or go to the beach, our brain stores a short-term memory of the experience in a part of the brain called the hippocampus. Those memories are later “consolidated”—that is, transferred to another part of the brain for longer-term storage. A new MIT study of the neural circuits that underlie this

In another segment of our Neurovox series, Vania Cao, PhD, interviews Amar Sahay, PhD, an Assistant Professor at Massachusetts General Hospital, Center of Regenerative Medicine, Harvard Medical School. He is also a Principal Faculty at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, and an Associate member of the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. He tells us