Internships

Master’s student position in Neural Circuit Development

The successful candidate will work in the Neural Circuit Development Lab at the Center for Integrative Biology (CBI) in Toulouse, on a project aimed at studying neural circuit assembly during development.

The project

Establishing dendritic arbors with the appropriate sizes and shapes is critical for proper wiring of the central nervous system. In the fly, as in the human eye, dedicated sets of neurons extract the direction of image motion from specific points in the visual word. Such local motion detectors are known as T4/T5 neurons in the fly. Some T4/T5 neurons are sensitive to a stimulus presented to the eye moving from left to right, others top to bottom, and so forth. To compute motion, each neuron must compute information from neighboring points in the visual space. T4/T5 neurons achieve this by extending their dendrites across small regions of the fly optic lobe to receive signals from various presynaptic partners that relay information from neighbouring points in the visual space. As such, the size of each T4/T5 dendrite is poised to establish the neuron’s acuity and local motion resolution. 

We have used scRNAseq to profile developing T4/T5 neurons. This offered us candidate genes involved in establishing the size of each T4/T5 dendritic arbor. Departing from this dataset you will use sophisticated genetics and advanced live imaging approaches, to study how dendrite size is regulated to achieve wiring specificity and establish visual motion detection in the fly.

Profile

We are seeking a highly motivated, enthusiastic, creative and friendly individual to join our growing team. The candidate should have a strong interest in neural differentiation, neural circuit formation and developmental neurobiology.

Interested applicants please address applications, including a personal statement, CV and the contact of two referees to filipe.pinto-teixeira@univ-tlse3.fr.

The lab

The Neural Circuit Development Lab is a young and international lab. We are generously funded by the Fondation Bettencourt Schueller, ATIP-AVENIR, CNRS, University Paul Sabatier and the CBI.

The lab is housed at the CBI brand new building. The CBI is a multidisciplinary institute comprising 40 research teams, including a community of 9 fly labs. The Neural Circuit Development Lab is at the crossroads between the Stem Cells and Development Biology, and Molecular and Cellular Neurobiology Programs.

For more information please visit www.pintoteixeiralab.com