Grant: Project Grant

Solving brain disorders requires knowledge of the molecular components, their architecture and spatial dynamics and their signaling interactions inside subcellular compartments. The scale of molecular components (e.g. nanometers) inside cells has however precluded scientists from observing them in their proper native, live context. We and others have developed methods, called super-resolution optical methods, which we propose to use to study synaptic signaling and remodeling in brain tissue, either developing in culture or from post-mortem human brains. This novel approach should yield an unprecedented understanding of the molecular architectures in brain cells that undergo constructive changes during learning or destructive changes in brain diseases.