Giuliano Taccola is an Associate Professor in Physiology at the International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA) in Italy (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2675-1438). He is an established Principal Investigator, leading his own laboratory of Applied Neurophysiology and Neuropharmacology at the Regional Spinal Center in Udine and collaborating with scientists worldwide to study the physiology of spinal motoneurons, the development and plasticity of spinal networks, their pharmacological and electrical neuromodulation, as well as the cellular, circuit and systems mechanisms at the base of spinal cord injury and other neuromotor disorders.
Taccola’s lab has a vast experience on in vitro spinal cord preparations isolated from neonatal rodents, performing intracellular recordings from single motoneurons using microelectrodes, AC- and DC- coupled recordings from spinal roots and peripheral nerves, and whole cell patch clamp recordings from spinal inter- and moto- neurons performed in current/voltage clamp modes. Since 2015, he researches also on preclinical animal models with and without a spinal cord injury, in a still ongoing collaboration with UCLA and the University of Leeds, where he worked from 2015 to 2018 with a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Global Individual Fellowships (https://cordis.europa.eu/project/rcn/196101/factsheet/en). This line of research combines cutting-edge in vivo and in vitro electrophysiology, neuropharmacology, multi-electrode interfaces and neuroprosthetics, and behavioural neuroscience.
As part of this collaboration, Giuliano Taccola explores new pharmacological and electrical stimulating protocols to restore motor functions in preclinical rodent models of spinal cord injury.
In the coming years, in vivo electrophysiological and behavioural assessments in preclinical models will be associated to in vitro recordings from reduced spinal cord preparations in order to:
Further define the biophysical membrane properties of motoneurons during development, the organization of neonatal interneuronal spinal networks generating rhythmic activity and their pharmacological modulation.
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Explore the effects of passive training on spinal circuits, also comparing real locomotor training with a recently invented robotic device (BIKE, Bicycle Induced Kinetic Exercise) that reproduces a standardized hindlimb passive motion in the isolated spinal cord – leg attached preparation of neonatal rats.
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Limit the acute consequences of a spinal cord injury and support the recovery of functions in chronic spinal cord injuries, by associating innovative electro-stimulating protocols, stochastically modulated in both frequency and amplitude (noisy), with the design of innovative multi-electrode epidural interfaces for independent multi-site stimulation and recordings, and combine them with new pharmacological interventions.
