Description:

The Department of Neuroscience welcomes Dr. Alex Kwan, Associate Professor, with Yale University to the 2021/2022 seminar series.

Abstract

Numerous chemical compounds have the ability to alter our perception, cognition, and mood. Some of these compounds, such as ketamine and the serotonergic psychedelics, have also shown promise as treatments for depression. The behavioral effects are often long-lasting, presumably because the drugs act on synapses and dendrites to induce plasticity in the brain. In this talk, I will discuss my lab’s work on understanding the impact of psychoactive drugs on cortical microcircuits in mice. Specifically, I will describe a series of studies using subcellular-resolution two-photon imaging and other techniques to dissect the effects of ketamine and psilocybin on the structure and function of dendrites.