Research activities

The Laboratory for Biophotonics and Neurophysics is an interdisciplinary team jointly operated 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 transduction in the nervous system and to apply experimental physics methods to neuroscientific problems.
Its core facility is an in vivo two-photon microscopy platform that allows non-invasive structural and functional imaging in small animal models at different scales: from macroscopic imaging of entire brains to high-resolution microscopy of neural networks, single neurons, and even subcellular structures. In vivo mapping of brain activity is implemented via calcium imaging techniques at high temporal resolution.
The laboratory's research activities start at the receptor level (olfaction, vision, magnetoreception) testing potential quantum biological models, to studies of information coding and transduction mechanisms in primary processing centers to learning-associated changes in the structure and function of large neural networks. A promising model animal for this is the honey bee. With a brain of only one million neurons, it shows exceptional performances in a broad spectrum of behaviours such as communication, navigation, and learning.
In order to decipher coding mechanisms, connectivity and plasticity down to the single neuron level, we added optogenetic tools to our experimental repertoire, which enables us to artificially stimulate single network nodes and then follow the propagation of that stimulus throughout the whole network.

Neurophysics

• Neuronal coding mechanisms
• Neuronal network dynamics
• Mechanoreception

Biophotonic

• Structural and functional multi-photon imaging
• Optogenetic manipulation

Quantum biology

• Vibrational theory of olfaction
• Magnetoreception mechanism

Insect neuroscience

• Learning-induced neural plasticity
• Chemical communication
• Sleep
• Effects of neuroactive pesticides 
• Alternative pest management strategies

Membri del gruppo