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My major research interest is the evaluation of plasticity of the
normal/healthy vs. damaged nervous system on behavioral and system/cellular
levels. I am currently using a rat animal model of alcohol abuse during
pregnancy, to study the damaging effects of alcohol on the developing
brain and on the altered behavior. The major questions that I address
in my current research are the extent of the alcohol-related damage
and whether behavioral intervention can ameliorate that damage on
both behavioral and structural levels. In attempt to improve behavioral
(motor) performance and increase brain plasticity in alcohol-exposed
animals I am using different conditions (motor task learning, physical
exercise) that are known to facilitate brain synaptogenesis. The
evaluation of plasticity is done on the behavioral (testing
the motor abilities and memory), cellular (light microscopy,
immunohistochemistry, optical densitometry, neuronal tract-tracing)
and sub-cellular (electron microscopy) levels. For more information,
see this recent article, courtesy of the University of Illinois.
The major questions that I am planning to answer are:
- Is the brain more susceptible for rehabilitation at in postnatal development or adolescence?
- How persistent is the behavioral and morphological rehabilitation / compensation?
- What are the "players" underlying the mechanism of
developmental damage by alcohol and possible rehabilitation
(e.g.neurotrophic factors, glial activation)?
- What are the limits for partial rehabilitation if the
damage from developmental alcohol exposure is more widespread in the
brain (in case of alcohol exposure during all three trimesters)?
- Is there a suppression of neurogenesis and/or cell genesis in the alcohol-exposed brain (cortex and hippocampus)?
- And in case the neuronal proliferation is down after
developmental exposure to alcohol - is it possible to stimulate it by
learning and exercise?
