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Sadegh Nabavi works with optogenetics, using light to study specific brain cells in laboratory animals. These could, for example, be neurons in the brain which are genetically engineered to make the animals – typically mice – sensitive to light. When the researchers illuminate these cells using special equipment, they are able to manipulate neuronal activity, enabling them to study activity in the neural networks of the brain.

Working with American and Australian colleagues, Sadegh Nabavi aims to develop a technique for selective manipulation of various nerve pathways that cooperate on a specific process. Something that can’t be done today. In time, this will give us a much better understanding of how different networks of neurons influence specific behaviours such as anxiety.

Sadegh Nabavi’s project is a continuation of an earlier project for which he received an NIH BRAIN Initiative grant from the Lundbeck Foundation in 2018.