Trio preserves motor ability during aging
Is the weakening of motor ability with age inevitable? In a new study we show that motor neuron synapse levels of the conserved Rac GEF protein Trio reduce with age in Drosophila. Increasing Trio expression during aging (including by expression of transgenic human Trio) preserves the structure of motor synapses during aging, improving their function (…)
Protein ‘traffic jam’ linked to neurodegeneration
The Cruelest Cut: EPFL article about our new paper, led by Jamshid, which shows that Retromer deficiency, which is implicated in both Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s Disease, increases human Tau truncation and toxicity. In the paper we also describe new tools to quantitate neurodegeneration with single synapse or axon resolution in intact Drosophila brains.
Welcome New Lab Members
Welcome to new lab members Medha, Amin and Rebecca. Delighted to have you join us and work on projects in synaptic plasticity, miniature neurotransmission and neurotransmitter logic.
Brain metrics reveal sex differences
EPFL article about our paper using genetic tools built for computer assisted science – which we have dubbed ‘robogenetics’. Using these tools to quantitate the entire Drosophila larval Central Nervous System, we find less neurons (10.3K) plus more glia than predicted and that females have 10% more neurons than males. EPFL article, eLife paper
Congratulations Soumya
Congratulations to Soumya on his new position as senior scientist at Epiterna. We are very happy you are staying in Lausanne and continuing to work on ageing.
Innosuisse article on ALS project
Innosuisse support enables us to develop novel potential gene therapies for the motor neuron disease Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Read more in this article by Innosuisse about the project.
Well done Wei
Congratulations to Wei on her new position at our neighboring institute of the University of Lausanne – UNIL. We are very happy you are staying in Lausanne and we look forward to collaborating.
Congratulations Jamshid
Congratulations to Jamshid on his new position as Data Manager at Clario. They could not have made a better choice.
Brain ‘noise’ keeps nerve connections young
Nice article by Giorgia Guglielmi on EPFL news about our paper on miniature neurotransmission and ageing.
Minis maintain synapses
Exciting new publication from the lab on miniature neurotransmission and ageing led by Soumya. In the paper we describe a new adult Drosophila motor synaptic terminal NMJ preparation, genetic tools and electrophysiology methods. We use the prep to examine the effects of ageing on motor synapses. We find that synaptic terminal boutons fragment into smaller (…)