Developmental Neurobiology
Faculty of Biology and Biotechnology

Research program

The research is centered around central nervous system development in mammals focussing in particular on the visual system. We are interested in interneurons and the mechanisms of phenotype specification of the many inhibitory interneuron types in the visual cortex. Using the in vitro system of organotypic slice cultures and an in vivo approach with osmotic minipumps (collaboration with Prof. Maffei, CNR, Pisa, Italy) we study the role of neurotrophic factors, neuronal activity and afferent innervation for the molecular differentiation of interneuron types. The aim is to characterize for each of the interneuronal function markers (transmitter synthetic enzymes, calcium-binding proteins, specific receptor and channel proteins, neuropeptides) the hierarchy of environmental factors which in sum led to the expression of cell type-specific neurochemical signatures.

Other ongoing studies analyze: the role of neurotrophins for dendritic differentiation, the role of trophic factors for regulation the expression of trophic factors and their receptors, neurochemistry and intemeuronal gene expression in synRas transgenic mice (collaboration with Prof. Heumann, Faculty for Chemistry), the role of glutamate receptors for dendritic differentiation (collaboration with Prof. Hollmann, Faculty for Chemistry), regulation of expression of interneuron-enriched potassium channels.