Na Ji, UC Berkeley (left) and Jeanne Paz, UC San Francisco (right)
The Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute (HWNI) is pleased to announce that UC Berkeley Professor Na Ji and UC San Francisco Associate Professor Jeanne Paz are the winners of the 2024 Rennie Fund for the Study of Epilepsy. They will receive a one-year $40,000 award for their collaborative project, which is described below. The Rennie Fund was created in 1962 as the result of a bequest from the Mary Elizabeth Rennie Trust to support research on epilepsy.
Read about their winning proposal:
Voltage imaging of epileptic discharges in mouse models of epileptic disorders
Na Ji (Co-Principal Investigator)
Professor
Department of Molecular and Cell Biology
Department of Physics
Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute
University of California Berkeley
Jeanne Paz (Co-Principal Investigator)
Associate Professor
Gladstone Institutes
UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences
The Kavli Institute for Fundamental Neuroscience
University of California San Francisco
Epilepsy is characterized by spontaneously recurring epileptic seizures whose cellular and circuit mechanisms are unknown. The Paz lab has developed mouse models of epileptic disorders and acquired electrophysiological recordings from thalamic and cortical neurons that are active during seizures. Due to the poor spatial resolution of electrical recordings, the synaptic origins of the epileptic discharges remain unknown. The Ji lab has recently developed an ultrafast two-photon fluorescence microscopy method that is capable of recording voltage activity from hundreds of neurons in vivo at kilohertz frame rate. We will combine the expertise of both labs by using voltage imaging to visualize the spatial and temporal patterns of thalamic and cortical activity during epileptic discharges in behaving mouse models of epileptic disorders. By visualizing in vivo the spatial extent of thalamocortical dysfunction at unprecedented resolution, voltage imaging will help identify seizure origins and evaluate treatment options.
About the Rennie Fund for the Study of Epilepsy
The Rennie Fund was created in 1962 as the result of a bequest from the Mary Elizabeth Rennie Trust to the UC Regents, to be used at their discretion for the study of epilepsy. It was later allocated to the UC Berkeley campus, and in 2017, the fund was transferred to the Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute.
Each year, a grant of $20-40K is awarded to a single research group or a team. Proposals can be directly related to epilepsy, or to closely related areas in neuroscience. Funds are available for one year and can be used to support research, development, conferences, and postdoc/graduate student support. To learn more about the Rennie Fund for the Study of Epilepsy, visit the fund page