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Optogenetics
Optogenetics is a biological technique to control the activity of neurons or other cell types with light. This is achieved by expression of light-sensitive ion channels, pumps or enzymes specifically in the target cells. On the level of individual cells, light-activated enzymes and transcription factors allow precise control of biochemical signaling pathways. In systems neuroscience, the ability to control the activity of a genetically defined set of neurons has been used to understand their contribution to decision making, learning, fear memory, mating, addiction, feeding, and locomotion. In a first medical application of optogenetic technology, vision was partially restored in a blind patient. Optogenetic techniques have also been introduced to map the functional connectivity of the brain''.'' By altering the activity of genetically labelled neurons with light and using imaging and electrophysiology techniques to record the activity of other cells, researchers can identify ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Karl Deisseroth
Karl Alexander Deisseroth (born November 18, 1971) is an American scientist. He is the D.H. Chen Professor of Bioengineering and of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University. He is known for creating and developing the technologies of hydrogel-tissue chemistry (e.g., CLARITY, STARmap) and optogenetics, and for applying integrated optical and genetic strategies to study normal neural circuit function, as well as dysfunction in neurological and psychiatric disease. In 2019, Deisseroth was elected as a member of the US National Academy of Engineering for molecular and optical tools for his discovery and control of neuronal signals behind animal behavior in health and disease. He is also a member of the US National Academy of Sciences and the US National Academy of Medicine. Education Deisseroth earned his AB in biochemical sciences from Harvard University, and his MD and PhD in neuroscience from Stanford University in 1998. He completed his medical internship a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Hegemann
Peter Hegemann (born 11 December 1954) is a Hertie Senior Research Chair for Neurosciences and a Professor of Experimental Biophysics at the Department of Biology, Faculty of Life Sciences, Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany. He is known for his discovery of channelrhodopsin, a type of ion channels regulated by light, thereby serving as a light sensor. This created the field of optogenetics, a technique that controls the activities of specific neurons by applying light. He has received numerous accolades, including the Rumford Prize, the Shaw Prize in Life Science and Medicine, and the Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research. Early life and education Hegemann was born in Münster in 1954, but grew up in Aachen. Many in his immediate and extended family are doctors, including his parents, brother, and both grandfathers. He was educated in a humanities-oriented '' gymnasium'' (''humanistisches Gymnasium'') for secondary school, which he disliked for his lack of i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Channelrhodopsin
Channelrhodopsins are a subfamily of retinylidene proteins ( rhodopsins) that function as light-gated ion channels. They serve as sensory photoreceptors in unicellular green algae, controlling phototaxis: movement in response to light. Expressed in cells of other organisms, they enable light to control electrical excitability, intracellular acidity, calcium influx, and other cellular processes (see optogenetics). Channelrhodopsin-1 (ChR1) and Channelrhodopsin-2 (ChR2) from the model organism ''Chlamydomonas reinhardtii'' are the first discovered channelrhodopsins. Variants that are sensitive to different colors of light or selective for specific ions (ACRs, KCRs) have been cloned from other species of algae and protists. History Phototaxis and photoorientation of microalgae have been studied over more than hundred years in many laboratories worldwide. In 1980, Ken Foster developed the first consistent theory about the functionality of algal eyes. He also analyzed published ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gero Miesenböck
Gero Andreas Miesenböck (born 15 July 1965) is an Austrian scientist. He is currently Waynflete Professor of Physiology and Director of the Centre for Neural Circuits and Behaviour (CNCB) at the University of Oxford and a fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford. Education and early life A native of Austria, Miesenböck was educated at the University of Innsbruck and Umeå University in Sweden. He graduated sub auspiciis praesidentis rei publicae from the University of Innsbruck Medical School. Following his Doctor of Medicine (MD) in 1993, he undertook postdoctoral training with James Rothman. Research and career Miesenböck is known as the founder of optogenetics. He was the first scientist to modify nerve cells genetically so that their electrical activity could be controlled with light. This involved inserting DNA for light-responsive opsin proteins into the cells. Miesenböck used similar genetic modifications to breed animals whose brains contained light-responsiv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zhuo-Hua Pan
Zhuo-Hua Pan (; born 1956) is a Chinese-American neuroscientist, known for his foundational contributions to optogenetics. He is the Edward T. and Ellen K. Dryer Endowed Professor of Ophthalmology at Wayne State University, and Scientific Director of the Ligon Research Center of Vision at the university's Kresge Eye Institute. Education and career Pan was born 1956 in Pujiang County of Jinhua, Zhejiang, China. After graduating from Jinhua No. 1 High School, he entered the University of Science and Technology of China in 1978 and earned his B.S. degree in 1982. He earned his M.S. in 1984 from the Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and became an instructor at Zhejiang University afterwards. In 1986, he moved to the United States to further his studies at the State University of New York at Buffalo. He earned his Ph.D. in 1990 and conducted postdoctoral research for another year. From 1991 to 1997 he was an instructor of neurology at Harvard Medical School an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Feng Zhang
Feng Zhang (; born October 22, 1981) is a Chinese-American biochemist. Zhang currently holds the James and Patricia Poitras Professorship in Neuroscience at the McGovern Institute for Brain Research and in the departments of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Biological Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also has appointments with the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard (where he is a core member). He is most well known for his central role in the development of optogenetics and CRISPR technologies. Early life and education Zhang was born in China in 1981 and given the name 锋 (which means "point of a spear; edge of a tool; vanguard"). Both of his parents were computer programmers in China. At age 11, he moved to Iowa with his mother (his father was not able to join them for several years). He attended Theodore Roosevelt High School and Central Academy in Des Moines, graduating in 2000. In 1999 he attended the acclaimed Research Science Institute at MI ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Georg Nagel
Georg Nagel (born 24 August 1953 in Weingarten, Germany) is a biophysicist and professor at the Department for Neurophysiology at the University of Würzburg in Germany. His research is focused on microbial photoreceptors and the development of optogenetic tools. Scientific career Georg Nagel studied biology and biophysics at the University of Konstanz, Germany. He received his PhD from the University of Frankfurt in 1988, working at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics in Frankfurt. As a postdoc, he worked at Yale University and Rockefeller University, US. From 1992 to 2004, he headed an independent research group in the Department of Biophysical Chemistry at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics in Frankfurt. Since 2004, he is a professor at the University of Würzburg, Germany, first at the Department for Molecular Plant Physiology and Biophysics, since 2019 at the Department for Neurophysiology. Research Georg Nagel, together with Peter Hegemann, is credited with the di ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward Boyden
Edward S. Boyden is an American neuroscientist at MIT. He is the Y. Eva Tan Professor in Neurotechnology, a faculty member in the MIT Media Lab and an associate member of the McGovern Institute for Brain Research. In 2018 he was named a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. He is recognized for his work on optogenetics. In this technology, a light-sensitive ion channel such as channelrhodopsin-2 is genetically expressed in neurons, allowing neuronal activity to be controlled by light. There were early efforts to achieve targeted optical control dating back to 2002 that did not involve a directly light-activated ion channel, but it was the method based on directly light-activated channels from microbes, such as channelrhodopsin, emerging in 2005 that turned out to be broadly useful. Optogenetics in this way has been widely adopted by neuroscientists as a research tool, and it is also thought to have potential therapeutic applications. Boyden joined the MIT faculty in 2007, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Halorhodopsin
Halorhodopsin is a light-gated ion pump, specific for chloride ions, found in archaea, known as halobacteria. It is a seven-transmembrane retinylidene protein from microbial rhodopsin family. It is similar in tertiary structure (but not primary sequence structure) to vertebrate rhodopsins, the pigments that sense light in the retina. Halorhodopsin also shares sequence similarity to channelrhodopsin, another light-driven ion channel. Halorhodopsin contains the essential light-isomerizable vitamin A derivative all-trans-retinal. Due to the intense attention on solving the structure and function of this molecule, halorhodopsin is one of the few membrane proteins whose crystal structure is known. Halorhodopsin uses the energy of green/yellow light to move chloride ions into the cell, overcoming the membrane potential. Beside chlorides it transports other halides and nitrates into the cell. Potassium chloride uptake by cells helps to maintain osmotic balance during cell growth. By ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boris Valery Zemelman
Boris Valery Zemelman (born September 10, 1967) is an American neuroscientist who is one of the pioneers of optogenetics. Personal life Boris Zemelman, at the age of ten, immigrated to the United States with his parents Valery and Evelina Zemelman, and lived in Wilton, Connecticut. He graduated from Wilton High School, and for his excellent academic performance was awarded Charles G. Mortimer Scholarships.Gordon E. Fairclough''Wilton students reap awards for excellence'' in: The Hour vom 11. Juni 1985, S. 9f. auf Google News Archivsuche He studied Biochemistry at Stanford University, where he received his Doctorate with a dissertation on purification and characterization of a novel mammalian recombinase under professoI. Robert Lehman He is now an Assistant Professor of Neuroscience aThe Center for Learning and Memoryat the University of Texas at Austin. In the past, he was a guest researcher at the Dudman Lab at The Janelia Farm Research Campus Howard Hughes Medical Institut ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chlamydomonas Reinhardtii
''Chlamydomonas reinhardtii'' is a single-cell green alga about 10 micrometres in diameter that swims with two flagella. It has a cell wall made of hydroxyproline-rich glycoproteins, a large cup-shaped chloroplast, a large pyrenoid, and an eyespot that senses light. ''Chlamydomonas'' species are widely distributed worldwide in soil and fresh water. ''Chlamydomonas reinhardtii'' is an especially well studied biological model organism, partly due to its ease of culturing and the ability to manipulate its genetics. When illuminated, ''C. reinhardtii'' can grow photoautotrophically, but it can also grow in the dark if supplied with organic carbon. Commercially, ''C. reinhardtii'' is of interest for producing biopharmaceuticals and biofuel, as well being a valuable research tool in making hydrogen. History The ''C. reinhardtii'' wild-type laboratory strain c137 (mt+) originates from an isolate collected near Amherst, Massachusetts, in 1945 by Gilbert M. Smith. The species' name ha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ernst Bamberg
Ernst Bamberg (b. in Krefeld) is a German biophysicist and director emeritus of the Department of Biophysical Chemistry at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics. Career Bamberg received his PhD in physical chemistry from the University of Basel in 1971, and a habilitation in biophysical chemistry from the University of Konstanz in 1976. He was a Heisenberg fellow from 1979 to 1983, when he became head of an independent working group at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics in Frankfurt/Main. In 1988, he became an adjunct professor at Frankfurt University, which named him a full professor of biophysical chemistry in 1993, and professor emeritus in 2009. He has also been a director and Scientific Member at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics since 1993, and a senior investigator at the Cluster of Excellence Frankfurt (CEF) since 2008. Research Bamberg's research focuses on channelrhodopsins. With Georg Nagel and Peter Hegemann, who were attempting to identify the prot ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
