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Tools for Analysing, Repairing and Stimulating the Brain
Analyzing, repairing, and simulating complex biological systems, such as the brain, require tools for systematically mapping, dynamically observing, and dynamically controlling these systems. We are discovering new molecular principles to enable such technologies. For example, we discovered that one can physically magnify biological specimens by synthesizing dense networks of swellable polymer throughout them, and then chemically processing the specimens to isotropically swell them. This method, which we call expansion microscopy, enables ordinary microscopes to do nanoimaging – important for mapping molecules throughout cells, tissues, and organs. As a second example, we serendipitously discovered that microbial rhodopsins, genetically expressed in neurons, could enable their electrical activity to be precisely controlled in response to light. These molecules, now called optogenetic tools, enable causal assessment of how neurons contribute to behaviors and pathological states, and are yielding new candidate treatment strategies for brain diseases. Finally, we are developing, using new strategies such as robotic directed evolution, fluorescent reporters that enable the precision measurement of signals such as voltage. In order to reveal relationships between different molecular signals within a cell, we are developing spatial and temporal multiplexing strategies that enable many such signals to be imaged at once in the same living cell. We design all our tools to be easy to use, and we share all our tools as freely as possible. Scientifically, we are focusing on the integrated application of these tools to collect ground truth-oriented data for entire nervous systems, starting with C. elegans and the larval zebrafish, and for the investigation of brain aging, with the goal of creating biologically accurate computer simulations of such systems.
Date:
15 January 2026, 16:00
Venue:
Sherrington Building, off Parks Road OX1 3PT
Venue Details:
Event taking place in the Blakemore Lecture Theatre
Speaker:
Dr Edward Boyden (MIT)
Organisers:
Yicheng Su (University of Oxford),
Ivan Peckar (University of Oxford),
Luba Samson (University of Oxford)
Organiser contact email address:
ivan.pekar@well.ox.ac.uk
Host:
Cortex Club (University of Oxford)
Booking required?:
Not required
Audience:
Public
Editor:
Garry Cherepakhov
