Compte X
Biography
Training
- 1996: Ph.D., Faculty of Biology, Department of Molecular Genetics, Ohio State University, USA
- 1989: Bachelor of Science, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Department of Biology, American University of Beirut, Lebanon
Research
How does the genome build the brain? This is the central question of my research. Biology is the main property of the self-organizing capacity of molecular networks. The most fundamental of these networks is the genome. The most sophisticated is the brain. The genomic network produces a set of instructions that build the neural network. We are trying to understand what this set of instructions is. Specifically, we are interested in the two extremes of neural network characteristics. At one end, during development, there is the specification of cellular fate. At the other end is the formation of precise neural connections. Since each neuron is characterized by specific connections, the two characteristics must be linked. Over the past decade, we have made major contributions to understanding these issues. We have elucidated the basis for gene regulation of cell development specification in the fly retina (Aerts et al., 2009, 2010; Quan et al., 2016). In the process, we have linked the involvement of cell development in stem cells to tumour suppression (Bossuyt et al., 2009a,b; van Es et al., 2010). On the other hand, we have begun long-term work to understand the mechanisms that regulate the specificity, variability and robustness of the brain's wiring. Our data clearly show that brain wiring is a more complex and plastic process than has been appreciated in studies using the fly SNP as a model. We focused on how individual neurons integrate various attractive and repulsive signals during wiring of the brain, and how they interact with each other to make wiring choices (Srahna et al., 2006; Langen et al., 2013; Zschaetzsch et al., 2014; Oliva et al., 2016) and how this influences behaviour (Linneweber et al., 2020). Many of the genes that regulate the wiring of the brain are associated with human diseases. We have elucidated the roles of the Drosophila homologues of the FMRP protein (Morales et al., 2002; Reeve et al., 2005, 2008; Okray et al., 2015; Franco et al., 2017) and the amyloid precursor protein (Leyssen et al., 2005; Soldano et al., 2013) in axon growth and control. Finally, we have made considerable efforts to develop new computational, genetic and cell biology tools for mapping genetic and neural networks (Aerts et al., 2006; Ayaz et al., 2008; Choi et al., 2009; Nicolaï et al., 2010). These tools are being used by many scientists to shed new light on brain development.
Main publications
- Linneweber GA, Andriatsilavo M, Bias Dutta S, Bengochea M, Hellbruegge L, Liu G, EjsmontRK, Straw AD, Wernet M, Hiesinger PR, Hassan BA. A neurodevelopmental origin of behavioral individuality in the Drosophila visual system. Science. 2020. 367(6482):1112-1119.
- Quan XJ, Yuan L, Tiberi L, Claeys A, De Geest N, et al. Post-translational Control of the Temporal Dynamics of Transcription Factor Activity Regulates Neurogenesis. Cell. 2016. 164(3):460-75.
- Langen M, Koch M, Yan J, De Geest N, Erfurth ML, et al. Mutual inhibition among postmitotic neurons regulates robustness of brain wiring in Drosophila. Elife. 2013. 2:e00337.
- Choi CM, Vilain S, Langen M, Van Kelst S, De Geest N, et al. Conditional mutagenesis in Drosophila. Science. 2009. 324(5923):54.
- Morales J, Hiesinger PR, Schroeder AJ, Kume K, Verstreken P, et al. Drosophila fragile X protein, DFXR, regulates neuronal morphology and function in the brain. Neuron. 2002. 34(6):961-72.