NEUROLIDAR project kick off: measuring neural dynamics with label-free optical multi-domain recordings

by Filippo Pisano

Wednesday 11 Jun 2025, 15:00 → 16:00 Europe/Rome

1/1-3 - Aula B (Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia - Edificio Marzolo)

The growing societal burden of brain diseases is one of the most significant health challenges globally. To help diagnose or treat these pathologies, there is widespread agreement that a deeper understanding is needed on the origin of neural disorders linked to electrical neural activity, neuromodulators dynamics and molecular alterations. 

To this aim, the combination of optical methods with genetically expressed molecular probes has enabled great advances in understanding brain mechanisms. However, the existing tools fail in capturing a comprehensive picture of multifaceted neural dynamics. In addition, the translational applications of these techniques are hindered by the need for exogenous reporters. 

As a result, there is a major scientific and technological gap that obstructs the full exploitation of cutting-edge neuro technologies to relieve the impact of brain diseases in the human population. To bridge this gap, the NEUROLIDAR project proposes an innovative approach to monitor neural dynamics in the mammalian brain using label free light matter interactions without exogenous reporters. 

This seminar will cover an introduction to the state of the art in deep brain neurophotonics and it will discuss the challenges and approaches to reach the project's objectives: (i) developing label free molecular sensing in arbitrary deep brain regions, (ii) developing label free, multifunctional, ultrathin, all-optical probes for dissecting the local micro-circuitry and (iii) developing label free, large-scale all-optical systems for multifunctional recordings at the global brain scale.