Blue Brain Seminar - The organization and function of enigmatic neocortical layer 1

Blue Brain is delighted to announce that the next seminar in the series in Neural Computation, will be on “The organization and function of enigmatic neocortical layer 1’. The seminar will be given by Prof. Bernardo Rudy from the Neuroscience Institute, NYU School of Medicine where he is Professor, Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative Care, and Pain Medicine and Julius Raynes Professor of Neuroscience and Physiology, Department of Neuroscience and Physiology.
 
Abstract:
Sensory perception depends on neocortical computations that contextually integrate signals from sensory organs (bottom-up or feed-forward input) with internal information such as expectations, predictions, attention, emotions and memories (top-down proessing). This results in the generation of a percept that is appropriate for the behavioral needs of the animal. Bottom-up sensory information is first conveyed by the primary sensory thalamus to neocortical layers 4 and 5b/6 and is eventually relayed to the basal dendrites of pyramidal cells (PCs), the output cells of the neocortex found in layers 2/3 and 5. On the other hand, layer 1 (L1) is the main target of cortical and subcortical inputs that provide “top-down” information for context dependent sensory processing. However, the precise mechanisms that mediate contextual modulation remain unknown. L1 contains several poorly characterized subtypes of GABAergic interneurons. In addition, L1 contains the dendrites of several types of interneurons with somas in L2/3 and the axons of Martinotti cells, a subtype of GABAergic interneuron specialized for dendritic inhibition. L1 contains no excitatory cells, but it contains the distal, “tuft” dendrites of pyramidal cells in deeper layers. Understanding the processing of contextual signals by L1 interneurons and the interactions of these cells with the tuft dendrites of pyramidal cells, is crucial to understand sensory perception. I will describe novel findings on the organization and structure of neocortical L1 in the mouse cortex that advance our knowledge of the mechanisms of context dependent sensory perception.

Bio: Dr. Bernardo Rudy is a senior investigator interested in the organization and function of cortical circuits, and the cellular and circuit mechanisms of information processing in the neocortex. His lab has utilized molecular genetics and electrophysiological recording in acute brain slices and in vivo to study brain circuits involved in sensory processing, the mechanisms of acetylcholine (ACh) modulation of cortical circuits, the diversity and function of cortical GABAergic interneurons and the ion channels governing the functional properties of cortical neurons. Recently his lab developed a novel efficient and high-yield method (Channelrhodopsin-assisted patching) that allows the in vivo electrophysiological recording and labeling of neurons throughout the brain. Together with the lab of Gordon Fishell the Rudy lab they have developed novel genetic strategies to unravel and study the diversity of GABAergic interneurons in the neocortex and cholinergic neurons in the basal forebrain. This application presents a comprehensive research program that utilizes these and other innovations in addition to other cutting edge methods to achieve a new understanding of interneuron diversity in the neocortex and the mechanisms by which ACh regulates cortical activity and thereby help advance our knowledge of the mechanisms of sensory perception. His lab has a long-standing collaboration with the lab of Gordon Fishell, and collaborates extensively with other members of the NYU Neuroscience Institute including Simon Peron, Robert Froemke, Michael Halassa; Xiao-Jing Wang; Michael Long; Wenbiao Gan, Dmitry Rinberg, Alex Reyes, Adam Carter, Tony Movshon, Dan Sanes and Gyorgy Buzsaki. We also have a close collaboration with Dr. ZJ Huang at Cold Spring Harbor. Past trainees of the Rudy lab include 16 Ph.D. students and 19 postdoctoral fellows, many of whom have become independent tenure-track faculty members or are doing research in industry (2). Dr. Rudy teaches in the Core Neuroscience Course of the Neuroscience Program at NYU and a course on Neural Circuits and Behavior with Robert Froemke. He is PI of our T32 training grant. Dr. Rudy assembled the team working on this U19 and will function as the PD of the U19 program, as well as director of the administrative core and co-PI of Projects 1, 2, and 3.

The seminar is an open event, at the Blue Brain offices in the Campus Biotech, Geneva.  Upon arrival at the Campus Biotech, please sign in at the Campus Biotech reception.

Monday 7 October 2019
15:00-16:00

Blue Brain Project
Campus Biotech
Chemin des Mines 9
Geneva

Host: Srikanth Ramaswamy, Group Leader and Senior Scientist, Blue Brain Project

For more information, please contact [email protected]

How to get to the Seminar – https://www.epfl.ch/research/domains/bluebrain/blue-brain/contact/