Nael Nadif Kasri,
Professor Medical Neurosciences for Neurodevelopmental Disorders,
Radboud University Medical Center Nijmegen
Nael Nadif Kasri studied biochemistry at the KU Leuven (Belgium), followed by a PhD (2000-2004) in molecular biology at the KU Leuven with Prof. Dr. Humbert de Smedt. During my PhD thesis, he studied the role of Ca2+ and calmodulin in the regulation of Calcium channels. After his PhD he worked as a postdoctoral researcher (2005-2010) in the lab of Prof. Dr. Linda van Aelst at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where he studied the role of RhoGTPase signaling in excitatory synapses in the hippocampus. In 2010 he moved to the Netherlands and started his independent research group at the Radboudumc where he is part of the Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour. In 2011 he received the Hypatia Fellowship and Marie Curie reintegration grant. The key goal is to reveal novel neurobiological concepts by resolving the genetic and epigenetic networks that are disrupted in neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs), including intellectual disabilities, autism spectrum disorder and epilepsy. His team uses a multi-level strategy that combines functional genomics and molecular & cellular neurobiological approaches, such as the generation and characterization of iPSC-derived human neural cells and mouse models. In particular, his expertise in the generation of patients-derived neural lineages and their neurophysiological analysis at single cell and network level (MEA) is setting the stage in this novel research field. Over the past years, he has established protocols to differentiate iPSCs into a variety of neural lineages (cortical, dopaminergic, serotonergic), with bonafide neurophysiological properties both at the single-cell and network activity level. His group has shown that MEAs offer a robust, efficient and physiologically relevant readout to probe for patient-specific neuronal network phenotypes to link genes to NDDs.
Building Complex Neuronal Networks on Chips to Understand Neurodevelopmental Disorders
Tuesday, 25 October 2022 at 09:30
Add to Calendar ▼2022-10-25 09:30:002022-10-25 10:30:00Europe/LondonBuilding Complex Neuronal Networks on Chips to Understand Neurodevelopmental DisordersBioengineering for Building Microphysiological Systems 2022 in Rotterdam, The NetherlandsRotterdam, The NetherlandsSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com
Recent progress in human genetics has led to the identification of hundreds of genes associated with neurodevelopmental disorders (NDDs). Despite considerable progress in elucidating the genetic architecture of NDDs, a major gap exists between the genetic findings and deciphering the pathophysiology of NDDs. Induced pluripotent stem cell technology allow us to generate all cell types present in the brain, in vitro, in a patient-specific manner. However, for most NDDs we currently do no know the exact cellular loci of disease, i.e. which cell type is contributing to the pathophysiology. In this talk I will explain our strategy to disentangle the cell type-specific contribution to neuronal network phenotypes in the context of NDDs. We generate composite cultures consisting of well-defined cell types differentiated on micro-electrode arrays (MEA) to probe for neuronal network activity during development. In addition, we combine MEA recordings with transcriptomics within the same experiment (MEA-Seq) to identify molecular pathways that underlie specific neuronal network phenotypes observed in ASD subtypes. Our data indicate that MEA-Seq is a robust and sensitive method to perform genotype-phenotype analyses, which can serve as a powerful platform to identify functional points of convergence between NDD genes and be used for high-throughput drug screening assays.
Add to Calendar ▼2022-10-24 00:00:002022-10-25 00:00:00Europe/LondonBioengineering for Building Microphysiological Systems 2022Bioengineering for Building Microphysiological Systems 2022 in Rotterdam, The NetherlandsRotterdam, The NetherlandsSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com
Add to Calendar ▼2022-10-25 09:30:002022-10-25 10:30:00Europe/LondonBuilding Complex Neuronal Networks on Chips to Understand Neurodevelopmental DisordersBioengineering for Building Microphysiological Systems 2022 in Rotterdam, The NetherlandsRotterdam, The NetherlandsSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com
