Description:

Please join the Department of Pharmacology for a Works-in-Progress presentations

Tony Copeland-Hardin
PhD Candidate in the Laboratory of Jennifer Kearney, PhD

Characterization of Gene Modifiers in a Mouse Model of Epilepsy
Dravet syndrome is a severe infant-onset epilepsy caused by loss-of-function variants in SCN1A, encoding the Nav1.1 voltage-gated sodium channel α-subunit. Individuals with the same SCN1A variant differ in clinical severity, suggesting that additional genetic modifiers likely influence penetrance and expressivity of the primary mutation. Mice with heterozygous deletion of Scn1a recapitulate features of Dravet syndrome. Phenotype severity varies on different mouse strain backgrounds, and we mapped several strain-dependent modifier loci. We are investigating candidate microRNAs as modifier genes that may mediate the strain-dependent severity in the Scn1a+/- mouse model. The contribution of microRNAs in Dravet syndrome is largely unexplored; however, microRNAs may serve as potent therapeutic targets.

Vladimir Jovasevic, PhD
Research Assistant Professor, Department of Pharmacology

Cytoskeletal Gene Expression During Formation of Stress-Related Memories
Stressful experiences are usually remembered vividly for long periods of time, as found in PTSD, but sometimes result in memories that are difficult to access, as it is in the case of dissociative amnesia. We set out to determine, using mouse behavioral models, whether accessible and memories with restricted access differ in their consolidation mechanisms. Specifically, we focused on early protein modifications and delayed expression patterns of cytoskeleton-associated genes. Our findings demonstrate that the expression of cytoskeleton-associated genes remains highly dynamic even at remote time points, with increasingly diverging gene expression profiles of accessible and memories with restricted access.