Research Challenge

Our team at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) studies how the brain attends to signals from the body to maintain physiological balance and regulate behavior. Specifically, we focus on the cardiovascular system.

Cardiac processes and their neurological substrates are critical for homeostatic management of internal body condition as well as psychological and behavioral expression. Unfortunately, how communication between the heart and brain is maintained at beat-to-beat continuity is understudied. The overarching theme of our research is to understand in unprecedented detail how various peripheral neurons control basic cardiac physiology and how signals from the heart also influence the brain in a recurrent loop to give rise to appropriate behavior in health and disease. Even though cardiology is an old discipline, lack of genetic technologies has limited neuroscience research in this area.

We develop and employ neuroscience tools to address the following specific challenges

a) Genetic and functional characterization of cardiac sensory neurons

b) Assessment of the influence of cardiac sensory neurons on brain networks- from sensation to behavior

c) Exposition of aberrant signaling at the heart-brain axis in cardiovascular pathologies like myocardial infarction.

Elucidating the neurobiology of the heart is not only a crucial basic scientific endeavor, but it also offers significant translational promise for cardiovascular disorders that remain the largest killer globally.

Significance

Cardiovascular pathologies like myocardial infarction, congestive heart failure and hypertension are responsible for one in three deaths around the globe. This poses a significant challenge to our society. A mechanistic understanding of how the brain processes and responds to cardiovascular signals from the heart is sorely lacking. This is a major rate-limiting step in the development of therapies for disease interruption and deterrence.

Approach

We use state-of-the art neuroscience and molecular biology techniques

1)    Opto/Chemogenetics

2)    Calcium Imaging - Fiber Photometry, 2-Photon Microscopy

3)    RNA Sequencing

4)    Viral Tracing

5)    Tissue Clearing and Light Sheet Microscopy

6) Mesoscale Electrophysiological Recordings

7) Machine Learning Assisted Behavior Phenotyping

8) High Resolution Echocardiography