All-Optical Interrogation of Neural Circuits
Learn the strengths and limitations of two-photon optogenetic photostimulation for neuroscience research.
Gain first-hand insights into how multiphoton microscopy is uniquely suited to study complex spatiotemporal dynamics in the brain. Dr. Adam Packer discusses how his team used Bruker’s 2Pplus with NeuraLight 3D for two-photon optogenetic photostimulation and uncovering causal links between neuronal activity and behavior.
Presenter's Abstract
Neural circuits display complex spatiotemporal patterns of activity on the millisecond timescale during behavior. Understanding how these activity patterns drive behavior is a fundamental problem in neuroscience and remains a major challenge due to the complexity of their spatiotemporal dynamics. The ability to manipulate activity in genetically defined sets of neurons on the millisecond timescale using optogenetics has provided a powerful new tool for making causal links between neuronal activity and behavior.
I will discuss novel approaches that combine simultaneous two-photon calcium imaging and two-photon targeted optogenetic photostimulation with the use of a spatial light modulator (SLM) to provide an "all-optical" readout and manipulate of the same neurons in vivo. This approach enables the reading and writing of activity in neural circuits with single-cell resolution and single action potential precision during behavior. I will describe the power, limitations, and future potential of this approach; and discuss how it can be used to address many important problems in neuroscience, including transforming our search for the neural code and the links between neural circuit activity and behavior.
This webinar was presented on July 25, 2020.
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Guest Speaker
Dr. Adam Packer
Wellcome Trust Sir Henry Dale Fellow, University of Oxford
