Advances of application of optogenetics in animal behavioral research / 中国药理学通报

The method of optogenetics is a new light-control ccll technology which has developed rapidly in the field of neuro- science in the past decade. This technique is also called "a new technology destined to win the Nobel Prize in the 21st century". The bioengineering technology integrates many disciplines of optics, genetics, computer science, genetic engineering, cell biology, clectrophysiology and more. This new multi-disciplinary cross-disciplinary new technology has greatly promoted the development of neuroscience, extending to animal behavior, clinical medicine, molecular biology, cell biology and many other fields. Animal behavior research is about the study of the function, mechanism, development and evolution of animal behavior, which plays an important role in the development of neuro- science. This article describes the specific process and characteristics of optogenetics, and its application in animal behavior research, aiming at a brief review of the latest research progress in optogenetics technology.

Optogenetics Applications for Treating Spinal Cord Injury

Cases of spinal cord injury (SCI) are increasing all over the world; and in USA alone, there are 273,000 patients, which not only leads to morbidity and mortality but also results in a great economic burden. Many approaches are being used at the pre-clinical and clinical level to treat SCI including therapeutic agents, surgical decompression, stem cell therapy etc. Recently, a new approach called optogenetics has emerged in which light sensitive proteins are used to switch neurons on and off, and this approach has great potential to be used as therapy due to its specificity and rapid response in milliseconds. Few animal studies have been performed so far in which the respiratory and bladder function of rats was restored through the use of optogenetics. On the basis of promising results obtained, in the future, this approach can prove to be a valuable tool to treat patients with SCI.

Epilepsia fotosensible / Photosensitive epilepsy

La epilepsia fotosensible es una forma de epilepsia refleja que ocurre en pacientes con crisis provocadas por la estimulación luminosa intermitente a variados estímulos (televisión, luz solar, videojuegos u otros). El objetivo fundamental de este trabajo es la presentación de 4 pacientes con las características de esta epilepsia. Se describieron las manifestaciones clinicas de cada uno y su tratamiento. Ningún paciente presentó crisis epilépticas espontáneas. En todos los niños la maniobra de la fotoestimulación fue positiva, pero no provocó crisis epilépticas. Se concluyó que lograr la eliminación de los estímulos que provocan las crisis es más importante que su tratamiento medicamentoso

Photosensitive epilepsy is a kind of reflex epilepsy occurring in patients with crises provoked by the intermittent luminous stimulation to different stimuli (television, sunlight, videogames, etc). The main objective of present paper is the presentation of four patients presenting the features of this type of epilepsy. The clinical manifestations of each and its treatment were described. Any patient had spontaneous epileptic crises. In all children the maneuver of photostimulation was positive, but without epileptic crises. We conclude that the achievement the elimination of stimuli provoking crisis is more important than its drug treatment