Event:

"Optogenetics, In Vivo Robotics, 3-D Brain Building: Tools for Analyzing and Engineering the Brain"

Professor Boyden’s work is focussing on the development of genetically-encoded reagents that, when expressed in specific neuron types in the nervous system, enable their electrical activities to be precisely driven or silenced in response to millisecond timescale pulses of light.

In his lecture he will give an overview of these œoptogenetic tools, adapted from natural photosensory and photosynthetic proteins, and discuss new tools they are developing, including molecules with novel color sensitivities and other unique capabilities.