Grant: Research Tools and Instruments - Category 1 (<$150,000)

Electrophysiology is a technique used to study physiology of living cells and tissues by measuring their electrical properties, such as voltage change and current flow.  This is of particular importance in neuroscience, wherein action potentials may be recorded directly from neurons in-vivo.  Sharp glass electrodes are produced by heating glass capillaries using a laser puller, which provides force to pull glass apart and produce small tips with high resistance.  During intracellular neuronal recording, a sharp glass electrode is inserted directly into a neuron to record activity across the cell membrane.  Extracellular recording places the tip of the electrode near the neuronal surface, instead recording ion potential changes in the cell vicinity.  Both techniques require the use of low-noise amplifiers, filters and data acquisition devices to interpret results from random activity and noise within a preparation.  By using dual-electrode recording, it is possible to record from two areas simultaneously within insect brains.  The benefit of dual-electrode recording is that interactive neuronal processes such as inhibition or synergy in action potential firing may be documented from multiple neurons in real time.  After recording, neurons are stained to determine connections and targets throughout the brain.  I will use this combination of techniques to investigate insect olfaction, a simple model for higher olfactory processing.  In particular, mechanisms of sensory coding of chemical mixtures within the brain will be determined.  Insights provided through this study will be beneficial to medical, agricultural, basic neuroscience and artificial intelligence research throughout Canada and the world.