Laura Alberio#

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Laura Alberio
Senior Research Associate

I completed my PhD, with Prof Anna Moroni (Univ. Studi Milano, Italy) in 2017. We developed, and improved, a novel optogenetic potassium channel, called BLINK (Blue Light Induced K+ channel), as an alternative to the currently available inhibitory opsins.

I then joined Newcastle University as Postdoctoral Research Associate in the group of Professor Andy Trevelyan, to work on chloride regulation in neurons using optogenetics. In 2019 I was awarded a Faculty Fellowship to investigate the role of neuronal chloride levels on network excitability. Using in vivo 2-photon imaging, I have characterised the chloride dynamics of different subclasses of cortical neurons, with particular attention to interneurons.

I joined Jack’s lab as a postdoc in 2023 to investigate risk genes associated with schizophrenia and their effect on learning and memory

Research:#

My research focus is to assess how dendritic Ca2+ signalling, flexibility of contextual representations and adaptive behaviour are disrupted in mice with reduced expression of schizophrenia risk genes. I use in vivo 2-photon Ca2+ imaging of place cells activity during precisely defined behavioural tasks in a virtual reality system.

 

Outside of the lab

  • I like to read fiction and novels

  • Cooking, especially Italian dishes

  • Looking after my plants and flowers

  • and I love to start more crochet projects than I can finish

 

Publications:#

Daily rhythm in cortical chloride homeostasis underpins functional changes in visual cortex excitability
Enrico Pracucci*, Robert T. Graham*, Laura Alberio*, Gabriele Nardi*, Olga Cozzolino, Vinoshene Pillai, Giacomo Pasquini, Luciano Saieva, Darren Walsh, Silvia Landi, Jinwei Zhang, Andrew J. Trevelyan and Gian-Michele Ratto
Nature Communications, 2023 (article)

Optogenetic stimulation reveals a latent tipping point in cortical networks during ictogenesis
Robert T Graham, R Ryley Parrish, Laura Alberio, Emily L Johnson, Laura Owens, Andrew J Trevelyan
Brain, 2023 (article)

Gating movements and ion permeation in HCN4 pacemaker channels
Andrea Saponaro, Daniel Bauer, M. Hunter Giese, Paolo Swuec, Alessandro Porro, Federica Gasparri, Atiyeh Sadat Sharifzadeh, Antonio Chaves-Sanjuan, Laura Alberio, Giacomo Parisi, Gabriele Cerutti, Oliver B. Clarke, Kay Hamacher, Henry M. Colecraft, Filippo Mancia, Wayne A. Hendrickson, Steven A. Siegelbaum, Dario DiFrancesco, Martino Bolognesi, Gerhard Thiel, Anna Moroni
Molecular Cell, 2021 (article)

A light-gated potassium channel for sustained neuronal inhibition
Laura Alberio*, Andrea Locarno*, Andrea Saponaro, Edoardo Romano, Valérie Bercier, Shahad Albadri, Federica Simeoni, Silvia Moleri, Silvia Pelucchi, Alessandro Porro, Elena Marcello, Noemi Barsotti, Kerri Kukovetz, Arjen J. Boender, Andrea Contestabile, Shizhen Luo, Aubin Moutal, Yingshi Ji, Giulia Romani, Monica Beltrame, Filippo Del Bene, Monica Di Luca, Rajesh Khanna, Henry M. Colecraft, Massimo Pasqualetti, Gerhard Thiel, Raffaella Tonini and Anna Moroni
Nature Methods, 2018 (article)

Yeast-Based Screening System for the Selection of Functional Light-Driven K+ Channels
Cristian Cosentino, Laura Alberio, Gerhard Thiel, Anna Moroni
Methods in Molecular Biology, 2017 (article)

Engineering of a light-gatedpotassium channel
Cristian Cosentino,Laura Alberio, Sabrina Gazzarrini, Marco Aquila, Edoardo Romano, Solei Cermenati, Paolo Zuccolini, Jan Petersen, Monica Beltrame, James L. Van Etten, John M. Christie, Gerhard Thiel, Anna Moroni
Science, 2015 (article)