Lectures and seminars Research Lecture at Nobel Forum with Professor Bryan L Roth
The theme of the lecture is "Chemical and synthetic neurobiology". In his talk, Dr Bryan L Roth will present recent advances in the areas of synthetic and chemical neurobiology.
Speaker: Dr Bryan L Roth Michael Hooker Distinguished Professor of Protein Therapeutics and Translational Proteomics, UNC School of Medicine.
In his talk, Dr Bryan L Roth will present recent advances in the areas of synthetic and chemical neurobiology. Nerve cells communicate with each other via fast and slow synaptic transmission. Fast neurotransmission occurs within milliseconds when certain neurotransmitters, mainly glutamate and GABA, act on ligand-operated ion channels. Slow synaptic neurotransmission occurs over hundreds of milliseconds to minutes. Essentially all of the effects of the biogenic amines, e.g. dopamine, serotonin and noradrenaline, and peptides, e.g. substance P and CGRP, achieve their actions via slow neurotransmission. G protein coupled receptors (GPCRs) are critical in initiating slow neurotransmission and regulate intracellular signaling via second messengers, protein kinases, and protein phosphatases. Slow-acting neurotransmitters control the efficacy of fast synaptic neurotransmission by regulating neurotransmitter release from presynaptic terminals. Dr Bryan L Roth has developed tools to modulate slow GPCR-mediated neurotransmission in defined cellular circuitries by a chemogenetic platform called DREADD (Designer Receptors Exclusively Activated by Designer Drugs). Using this technology, his lab was the first to use DREADDs to silence and activate neurons. DREADD technology is now routinely used to interrogate circuits responsible for simple and complex behaviors. Dr Bryan L Roth has solved structures of different DREADDs, but also of several critical GPCRs including the dopamine D2 class of receptors, hallucinogenic 5-HT2A receptors and entire opioid receptor family. These structures have been used for virtual in silico screening to identify novel and highly selective and/or potent agonist and antagonists. Dr Bryan L Roth is also developing novel cell-based screening platforms to discover chemical probes and tools for GPCR research, such as the PRESTO-TANGO assay in which the entire GPCRome can be screened for activation. The work of Dr Bryan L Roth has important implications for understanding slow synaptic transmission and for the development of rational therapeutics for neurological and psychiatric diseases.
Host: Per Svenningsson, MD, PhD, is a Professor of Neurology, Karolinska Institutet, per.svenningsson@ki.se
Contact: Pernilla Witte, Nobel Office, Nobel Forum, 08-524 861 07, pernilla.witte@nobelprizemedicine.org