EDUCATION

1988          Université Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris, France) B.A., Neurophysiology
1989          Université Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris, France) M.A., Neurobiology
1993          Université Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris, France) Ph.D., Neurobiology         

PROFESSIONAL APPOINTMENTS

1993 – 1995         Postdoctoral Research Associate
                         The Max-Planck Institute, Munich, Germany

1995 – 2001         Postdoctoral Research Associate
                         Department of Neuropharmacology
                         The Scripps Research Institute, San Diego, CA                                         

2001-present       Research Assistant Professor
                         Department of Psychiatry
                         The Brudnick Neuropsychiatric Research Institute
                         University of Massachusetts Medical School, Worcester, MA

The hallmark of all drugs of abuse, including alcohol, is their powerful addictive properties that linger for years after the last drug intake. It has been proposed that addiction and relapse may both result from altered mnemonic processes. At the cellular level, the most studied forms of memory formation are long-term potentiation (LTP) and depression (LTD). Unfortunately, very little is known about how alcohol controls LTP and LTD. In our laboratory, we study a slightly different form of synaptic plasticity called Spike-timing-dependent plasticity (STDP) which presents the advantage of being elicited under more physiological conditions.

Drugs of abuse and memory

Our main focus is to understand how drugs of abuse alter the way dendritic arborization process electrical signals. Our approach is twofold. First, we examine the molecular and cellular underpinnings of memory formation at synaptic level in medium spiny neurons of the nucleus accumbens, a key brain region of the drug reward pathway. Second, we seek to better understand the effects of alcohol and opiates on these cellular mechanisms. Of particular interest is the role of specific electrical events in shaping synaptic plasticity, and their sensitivity to alcohol and opiates. These events are backpropagating action potentials (action potentials generated at the soma that invade retrogradely the dendritic arborization) and excitatory post-synaptic potentials (EPSPs). 

Techniques employed

Our technical expertise lies primarily in our ability to use several electrophysiological patch-clamp techniques to record various electrical events, ranging from single channel activity to action potentials from primary cell cultures, isolated neurons and fresh brain slices.