/sent on behalf of Sharon McCartney

Department of Physiology & Pathophysiology

Division of Neuroscience and Spinal Cord Injury Visiting Scientist Lecture

Friday, September 15th, 2017| Noon-1:00 pm

Physiology Seminar Room 431, Basic Medical Sciences Building

Dr. Jeremy Chopek, PhD

Dalhousie University
Department of Medical Neuroscience
Halifax, Nova Scotia

TOPIC: Dissecting Chx10 brainstem and V3 spinal microcircuits involved in movement initiation and production, one cell at a time.

 All are welcome to attend

Research Profile: Dr. Jeremy Chopek received his MSc (2009) in Kinesiology and PhD (2014) in the Department of Physiology & Pathophysiology, University of Manitoba under the supervision of Dr. Phillip Gardiner, in the Spinal Cord Research Centre.  His work examined how motor circuits were affected following spinal cord injury and exercise by examining alterations in motoneuron biophysical properties, stretch reflexes, gene expression and sensitivity to pharmacological agents. Currently, he is a post-doctoral fellow at Dalhousie University (2014-), Department of Medical Neuroscience working with both Dr. Zhang and Dr. Brownstone at University College London.  His work has began to characterize and understand microcircuit formation in both the medulla reticular formation, a centre vital for the initiation of movement and the lumbar spinal cord, the area in which movement is produced. To achieve this, he uses a combination of transgenic mouse lines, optogenetic or photo-manipulation of single cell or whole cell populations, in-vitro electrophysiology, viral tracers and 2P and confocal microscopy. To date, he has subdivided the chx10 neuronal population in the brainstem into two distinct cell populations based on their morphology, biophysical properties, connectivity and projection patterns.  In addition, he has also found a novel connectivity pattern of the spinal V3 interneuron population, which in addition to forming commissural connections also synapse locally with ipsilateral motoneurons.

For more information please contact
Dr. Brent Fedirchuk, 204-789-3762 or
Sharon McCartney, sharon@scrc.umanitoba.ca

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