Our brain is made up of 100 billion nerve cells – each one connected to around 10.000 others. To understand this enormously complex structure, we need to investigate the properties of nerve cells and the way in which they encode and transmit information.
Neurobiologists seek to explain the mechanisms that account for behaviour and for cognitive higher functions in terms of sensory signals, integration and motor output. The SISSA Neurobiology sector faces this challenge with an interdisciplinary approach, combining different research lines and closely working with physicists, mathematicians, nanotechnolgists and biologists.
From single molecules to synaptic plasticity, from sensory systems to advanced imaging techniques: all these fascinating research areas can be investigated in our labs in an original and fruitful way.
Research Fields
- Olfactory Systems and Ion Channels
- Applied Neurophysiology and Neuropharmacology
- Bionanotechnology
- New Materials and Neurons
- Phototransduction
- Structure and Function of Ionic Channels
- Dynamics of neuronal excitability
- Information processing and neural computation
New techniques developed in bionanotechnology, such as optical tweezers, are used to understand neuronal development.»
Spinal injury is produced by traumatic and nontraumatic causes that often induce long-term disability. This research ...»
Ion channels are key molecules for signal transduction across biological membranes. This research area explores the r...»
Combined electrophysiological, imaging and molecular biology approaches are used to study the molecular and cellular ...»
The aim of this research line is to develop new instrumentation and techniques for nanotechnology, biophysics and bio...»
This research line is interested in understanding how the brain represents the external world, working on the cellula...»
This research line aims at exploring the functional implication for information processing and neuronal dynamics, of ...»
This research line approaches the understanding of development and function of the nervous systems by the use of math...»