Vernier Lab

Research in the laboratory is dedicated to a comparative approach of the anatomical and physiological organization of the central nervous system in vertebrates and protochordates. The lab is made of five independent teams, working on different aspects of neurogenesis, brain regionalization, neuronal differentiation and neural crest development. The overall aim of these researches is to make a link between the nature of the genes and the processes and steps they are controlling during development, and understand how such mechanisms have been used, recruited, modified during evolution, to allow for selection of adaptive structures and functions in a whole organism.

Our team has a long-standing interest in the comparative study of catecholamine systems in the brain of protochodates (ascidia and amphioxus), and vertebrates (lamprey, teleost fish, xenopus, chicken). We are now using zebrafish as one of our favorite experimental model to study the gene networks involved in the differentiation of dopaminergic and cholinergic neurotransmitter systems in the zebrafish forebrain. We also use zebrafish as models to study pathophysiological features of Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer disease.

We are using are detailed anatomical studies (HIS and immunocytochemistry) of gene expression patterns over time, morpholino-induced changes in gene expression, transgenic lines expressing fluorescent reporters and fate mapping, to decipher the pathways to neurotransmitter differentiation. We are developing in vivo imaging means to study the dynamic of regulation of catecholamine receptors and transporters. We also use pharmacological treatment, as well as specific toxic lesion of dopamine systems, to better understand the multiple aspects of the "dopaminergic phenotype". Comparison of data in zebrafish with those obtained in other models is essential for identifying conserved, fundamental mechanisms of differentation, vs derived, adaptive features. The goal of our research is to provide a better understanding of the cellular mechanisms determining the variety of neurotransmitter phenotypes in the brain, and of the link between these differentiation mechanisms and the cell-specific degeneration taking place in Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer disease.