NACS Seminar: Dr. Tim Mosca

'Connecting Neurodevelopment and Neurodegeneration through the cellular mechanisms of synaptic maturation'

Title: Connecting Neurodevelopment and Neurodegeneration through the cellular mechanisms of synaptic maturation

The exquisite series of events that underlies synaptic organization in the brain requires a symphony of molecular players that coordinate to achieve multiple goals. Synapses must find their correct target, make initial connections, and then importantly, allow those connections to undergo maturation to become robust and reliable functioning adult synapses. Though considerable work has studied the mechanisms underlying synapse formation, we know far less about the events between formation and adult function, namely, synapse maturation. This represents the time in which protein cascades take a synapse from a nascent, weak adhesive link to an full-fledged connection. In the Mosca Lab, we study the molecular mechanisms of how synapses mature. In this seminar, I will discuss the novel molecular mechanisms involving receptor cleavage that we’ve discovered to promote synapse maturation and discuss how we think these mechanisms bridge neurodevelopment and neurodegeneration. By studying and learning how maturation occurs, we can more deeply understand how neurodevelopmental, neuropsychiatric, and even neurodegenerative diseases go awry when the basic steps of synapse development fail to occur properly.”

Dr. Mosca is an Assistant Professor at Thomas Jefferson University.

NACS Seminars are free and open to the public.