Study of the evolutively maintained molecular nanomachine regulating neurotransmitter release in chemical synapses, using combined genetic, molecular and neurophysiological techniques in fruitflies. Alterations of these molecular components are observed in some psychiatric diseases (i.e. schizophrenia, depression, autism) where they can led to a synaptic dysfunction, to a consequent modification of postsynaptic integration and, finally, to an altered information coding fo post-synaptic neurons.

Adaptive behaviors in response to sudden environmental modifications (i.e., food finding; predator identification; detection of another individual) have and had an enormous evolutive significance. They are based on fundamental brain processes similar among different and evolutively distant organisms (i.e. invertebrates and vertebrates). Are these similar mechanisms sharing also similar neural circuits and neurotransmitters ? Or, differently, did evolution "found" different functional strategies to process these similar adaptive behaviors ?
Using as model the fruitfly and the possibility to combine in this model sophisticated genetic, neurophysiological, and behavioral techniques, are investigated in this invertebrate complex behaviors like wake/sleep cycle, social interactions, decision making and action selection processes, selective attention during visuomotor or olfacto-motor responses, reward and fear behaviors.

Dissertations and Original Researches are proposed for the final discussion for acquiring the degree in Courses where Prof Megighian is faculty member as well as in other Courses in collaboration with the proper faculty members.


Suggested arguments

Organisms respond to stimuli from the environment by generating behavioral responses (adaptive behavior) composed of coordinated actions or inactions that aim to obtain the best advantage for the organism itself in evolutionary terms (survival of the individual and survival of the species). The processing of these adaptive behavioral responses requires the use of the most complex nervous activities (cognition) and resides in basic psychophysiological mechanisms that are shared in the various organisms (vertebrates as well as invertebrates) such as selective attention and decision making processes. In vertebrates, some macroscopic anatomical structures are involved in the processes that govern adaptive responses. These structures are present both in humans and primates as well as in animals distant from them such as other mammals or fish or agnates. These structures, however, are absolutely not identifiable in the nervous system of invertebrates, which is completely different from a macroscopic point of view from that of vertebrates. Yet, as mentioned, even invetebrates present adaptive responses with characters similar to those of vertebrates. Has evolution acted from the outside by selecting particular nervous structures to process these responses? Or, on the contrary, are these generated by nervous microcircuits present in both invertebrates and vertebrates, where the extreme flexibility in the responses of the latter is obtained by the redundancy of these microcircuits? The aim of my current research is to identify these microcircuits in invertebrates, using the analysis of visuomotor behavioral responses in a model animal such as the fruit fly and exploiting its genetic manipulability
Using as model the fruitfly and the possibility to combine in this model sophisticated genetic, neurophysiological, and behavioral techniques, are investigated in this invertebrate complex behaviors like wake/sleep cycle, social interactions, decision making and action selection processes, selective attention, reward and fear behaviors.
Possible pharmacological agents that act on the nervous system and that can interfere with the most complex functions are also being studied in view of their possible future use in humans as a treatment for mental illnesses or natural substances that in the environmental field can be used as natural repellents for insects carrying diseases or infesting agricultural crops.

Utilized techniques: behavioral quantitative analysis using video tracking techniques and offline computer analysis; simple genetic techniques (fruitfly lines crossings and selection of specific mutants using phenotipic markers); confocal microscopy techniques; neurophysiology and electrophysiology techniques.