The Laboratory for Biophotonics and Neurophysics, jointly run by the Department of Physics and CIMeC, investigates the physical principles of signal reception, transmission, and processing in neural systems using experimental physics approaches. Its core facility is a multi-photon microscopy platform enabling non-invasive imaging from whole brains to subcellular structures, combined with high-speed calcium imaging to link neural activity to behaviour. Research spans from sensory receptors (magnetoreception, vision, olfaction), including quantum biological mechanisms, to coding and plasticity in large-scale networks. The honeybee serves as a key model due to its compact yet highly capable brain. It allows in vivo studies of complex neural mechanisms such as sleep. We combine controlled stimulation, optogenetics, and behavioural assays with computational modelling. Spiking neural networks are used to interpret and predict results, including the role of noise in neural computation. Machine learning (CNNs) supports behavioural tracking and phenotype classification.

Research activities

The Laboratory for Biophotonics and Neurophysics is an interdisciplinary lab run jointly by the Department of Physics and the Center for Mind/Brain Sciences (CIMeC). The aim is to investigate the physical mechanisms underlying signal perception and transmission in the nervous system and to apply methods of experimental physics to neuroscientific problems.

The core facility is a two-photon microscopy platform that enables non-invasive structural and functional imaging in small animal models at different scales: from macroscopic imaging of whole brains to high-resolution microscopy of neuronal networks, single neurons and even subcellular structures. In vivo mapping of brain activity is performed using calcium imaging techniques with high temporal resolution.

The laboratory's research activities start at the level of receptors (sense of smell, vision, magnetoreception), for example, to test potential quantum biological mechanisms, and range from studies on information coding and transduction in primary processing centres to learning-related changes in the structure and function of large neuronal networks. A promising model species for this is the honeybee. With a brain of only one million neurons, it shows exceptional performance in a wide range of behaviours such as communication, navigation, and learning.

To decode coding mechanisms, connectivity and plasticity down to the level of individual neurons, we have expanded our experimental repertoire to include optogenetic tools that allow us to artificially stimulate individual network nodes and then follow the propagation of the stimulus throughout the entire network.

Neuroimaging results are confronted with behavioural experiments, e.g. learning and memory experiments based on the proboscis extension reflex of bees, and simulated with spiking neuronal network models.

Neurophysics

• Neuronal coding mechanisms
• Neuronal network dynamics
• Learning-induced neural plasticity

Biophotonic

• Structural and functional multi-photon imaging
• Optogenetic manipulation

Quantum biology

• Vibrational theory of olfaction
• Radical pair mechanism of magnetoreception

Applied insect neuroscience

• Effects of sublethal doses of neuroactive pesticides on insects
• Alternative pest management strategies

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