Danionella, a small tropical freshwater fish, has emerged as a distinguished model in systems neuroscience, owing to its tiny, fully transparent brain that persists into the adult developmental stage. This attribute presents unparalleled opportunities to observe brain-wide neuronal activity across different developmental phases, facilitating the detailed characterization of the establishment of neuronal circuits orchestrating complex behaviors, such as learning.

In this project, we will focus on the vestibular ocular reflex (VOR), a crucial behavior that orchestrates compensatory eye movements during body rotations, maintaining gaze stability. We strive to identify the developmental stage where this behavior initially becomes functional and to determine the age at which the fish begin fine-tuning this behavior, employing classical motor learning processes.

Throughout the project, we also aim to construct a map of the vestibular processing circuit in this novel model system for the first time, leveraging our advanced rotating light-sheet microscope and the protocols we have previously established. As a prospective PhD project in the long term, we envisage utilizing this model task to investigate neuronal plasticity and network alterations—hallmarks of learning—during the adaptation of the vestibular ocular reflex and to understand how such circuits are established over development.

Expertise to gain during the project:

• Behaviorial recordings

• Image processing

• Light-sheet microscope

• Calcium imaging of neuronal activity

• Data analysis in Python and/or Matlab

Supervisors: 

• Volker Bormuth  volker.bormuth@upmc.fr  

• Georges Debrégeas georges.debregeas@sorbonne-universite.fr
  

Location: Laboratoire Jean Perrin

Possibility to continue with a PhD: Yes