Adema Ribic
University of Virginia, VA·Neuroscience
The newborn brain goes through short windows, called critical or sensitive periods, when its circuits are especially easy to shape. The earliest of these windows depends on spontaneous activity that the brain produces on its own, on serotonin (a chemical messenger between neurons), and on the timing of birth.
- Fields
Neuroscience
Biology
- Topics
developmental neuroscience
prefrontal cortex
critical period
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jan 2030
What they work on
- Determine how premature birth alters synchronous intrinsic activity, the coordinated spontaneous firing of neurons, in the neonatal mouse prefrontal cortex using in vivo electrophysiology in preterm mice born one day early.
- Define how serotonin signaling, a chemical messenger triggered around birth, shapes the development of prefrontal circuits and cortical inhibition, using chemogenetics, optogenetics and confocal imaging.
- Test whether manipulating intrinsic activity and serotonin after birth can rescue the circuit and cognitive behavioral deficits seen in preterm mice, measured with behavioral assays.
More about the research
In sensory brain areas, these signals help build the brain's maps of the senses. Whether they also guide the development of the prefrontal cortex, the front part of the brain that supports thinking and decision-making, is not known. This question matters because premature birth raises the risk of atypical brain development.
Why it matters
Children born prematurely are at higher risk of atypical neurodevelopment and later problems with cognition. By pinpointing early steps in prefrontal circuit formation that depend on birth timing and serotonin, and testing whether they can be corrected after birth, this work could point to developmental windows and mechanisms relevant to protecting brain development in preterm infants.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Minghong Ma
Johns Hopkins University, MD·Neuroscience
Test whether olfactory epithelium inflammation or smell-neuron inactivation from adolescence to adulthood alters prefrontal pyramidal neurons in mice, using patch clamp recordings, and reverse effects with chemogenetic activation of olfactory-prefrontal circuits.
Mark D Bevan
Northwestern University, IL·Neuroscience
Determine how basal ganglia indirect-pathway activity and movement stay normal in presymptomatic MitoPark mice despite ongoing loss of dopamine neurons, using electrophysiology, imaging and behavior.
Alexandra Nelson
University of California-San Francisco, CA·Neuroscience
Test whether local inhibitory synapses within the striatum, and inhibitory inputs from the globus pallidus, are altered in and contribute to levodopa-induced dyskinesia, using in vivo and ex vivo electrophysiology, optogenetics, and chemogenetics in parkinsonian mice.
The school
University of Virginia: 43 labs on PI Pages, $814M a year on research, 413 research doctorates a year.
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