Séminaire Externe Pierre Vincent

Brief pulses of dopamine in the striatum are critical for reward-mediated learning, and the temporal coincidence of dopamine and other neuromodulators bears important significance in the cellular integration of these signals. Our approach is mainly based on monitoring the dynamics of cyclic nucleotide signaling with biosensors in mouse brain slice preparations, combined with in silico simulations. Our experiments show that the presence of specific isoforms of signaling enzymes in the striatum makes these neurons highly responsive to brief dopamine transients. We are currently analyzing how these features could lead to novel therapeutic strategies for Parkinson’s disease.