Barcelona
Aula A11G, 3a pta, Facultat de Física, UB
12/02/2020
Minicurs Xarxes Complexes
Data: 12, 19, 26 de Febrer i 4 de Març (13:30-15h)
Lloc: Aula A11G, Facultat de Física, UB
Professors: Maria Àngels Serrano, Marián Boguñá, Albert Diaz-Guilera i Jordi Soriano
+ info: http://ubics.ub.edu/mini_curs_xarxes
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people
22/01/2020
Seminar by Guillermo García [University of Turku]
DATE: 28 January 2020 (14:30h)
PLACE: Aula 3.20, 3rd floor, Faculty of Physics (Dpt.Física de la Matèria Condensada)
TITLE: Pairwise tomography networks for many-body quantum systems
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CLABB
grants
20/01/2020
There is one junior postdoc position available to work at the Universitat de Barcelona Institute of Complex Systems (UBICS) in the project “Nonlinear dynamics in complex multilayer networks under uncertainty (NETUND)”.
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UBICS
projects
20/12/2019
Minicurs Xarxes Complexes
Data: 12, 19, 26 de Febrer i 4 de Març (13:30-15h)
Lloc: Aula A11G, Facultat de Física, UB
Professors: Maria Àngels Serrano, Marián Boguñá, Albert Diaz-Guilera i Jordi Soriano
+ info: http://ubics.ub.edu/mini_curs_xarxes
read more
Spontaneous Functional Recovery after Focal Damage in Neuronal Cultures
Teller, S ; Estevez-Priego, E; Granell, C ; Tornero, D; Andilla, J ; Olarte, OE; Loza-Alvarez, P; Arenas, A; Soriano, J
ENEURO
7
1
(2020)
Damage in biological neuronal networks triggers a complex functional reorganization whose mechanisms are still poorly understood. To delineate this reorganization process, here we investigate the functional alterations of in vitro rat cortical circuits following localized laser ablation. The analysis of the functional network configuration before and after ablation allowed us to quantify the extent of functional alterations and the characteristic spatial and temporal scales along recovery. We observed that damage precipitated a fast rerouting of information flow that restored network's communicability in about 15 min. Functional restoration was led by the immediate neighbors around trauma but was orchestrated by the entire network. Our in vitro setup exposes the ability of neuronal circuits to articulate fast responses to acute damage, and may serve as a proxy to devise recovery strategies in actual brain circuits. Moreover, this biological setup can become a benchmark to empirically test network theories about the spontaneous recovery in dynamical networks.
Glutamate receptors in domestication and modern human evolution
O'Rourke, T ; Boeckx, C
NEUROSCIENCE AND BIOBEHAVIORAL REVIEWS
341 357
(2020)
There has been a recent resurgence of interest in the hypothesis that anatomically modern humans and domesticated species have followed convergent evolutionary paths. Here, we review results from domestication and modern-human evolutionary studies in order to evaluate evidence for shared changes to neurotransmission across these species. We compare genomic and, where available, brain-expression differences across 488 neurotransmitter receptor genes in 14 domesticated species and modern humans relative to their wild and archaic counterparts. This analysis highlights prevalent changes to glutamate - most notably kainate and metabotropic - receptor genes. We review evidence for these genes' expression and their respective receptor functions in the central nervous system, as well as phenotypes commonly associated with alterations to them. This evidence suggests an important role for kainate and metabotropic receptors in regulating hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis excitation, and we provide a mechanistic account of their actions in attenuating the stress response. We assess the explanatory potential of such actions in contributing to the emergence of the (self-)domesticated phenotype, in particular to reduced reactive aggression.
Patient-Specific iPSC-Derived Astrocytes Contribute to Non-Cell-Autonomous Neurodegeneration in Parkinson's Disease
di Domenico, A ; Carola, G ; Calatayud, C ; Pons-Espinal, M ; Munoz, JP ; Richaud-Patin, Y; Fernandez-Carasa, I ; Gut, M ; Faella, A ; Parameswaran, J ; Soriano, J ; Ferrer, I ; Tolosa, E ; Zorzano, A; Cuervo, AM ; Raya, A; Consiglio, A
STEM CELL REPORTS
12
2
(2019)
Parkinson's disease (PD) is associated with the degeneration of ventral midbrain dopaminergic neurons (vmDAns) and the accumulation of toxic alpha-synuclein. A non-cell-autonomous contribution, in particular of astrocytes, during PD pathogenesis has been suggested by observational studies, but remains to be experimentally tested. Here, we generated induced pluripotent stem cell-derived astrocytes and neurons from familial mutant LRRK2 G2019S PD patients and healthy individuals. Upon co-culture on top of PD astrocytes, control vmDAns displayed morphological signs of neurodegeneration and abnormal, astrocyte-derived alpha-synuclein accumulation. Conversely, control astrocytes partially prevented the appearance of disease-related phenotypes in PD vmDAns. We additionally identified dysfunctional chaperone-mediated autophagy (CMA), impaired macroautophagy, and progressive alpha-synuclein accumulation in PD astrocytes. Finally, chemical enhancement of CMA protected PD astrocytes and vmDAns via the clearance of alpha-synuclein accumulation. Our findings unveil a crucial non-cell-autonomous contribution of astrocytes during PD pathogenesis, and open the path to exploring novel therapeutic strategies aimed at blocking the pathogenic cross talk between neurons and glial cells.
