Electrophysiological techniques in Neuroscience

November 4 - 8, 2024 - Brussels (Belgium)

Electrophysiology is a cornerstone of neuroscience, providing crucial insights into the electrical activities underpinning neural function. This course will explore the techniques and applications of electrophysiology at cellular, animal, and human levels, emphasizing its role in understanding neural circuits and brain function. Through cellular electrophysiology, students will learn about ion channel behaviour and neuron signalling. Animal studies will illustrate how these principles translate to complex systems and behaviours. Finally, human electrophysiology, including EEG, will demonstrate how these methods are applied in clinical and research settings to unravel the complexities of the human brain.
    
The EURON course on electrophysiological techniques in neuroscience will extend over 8 half-days, starting on Monday afternoon and ending on Friday morning.
The aim is to provide PhD students with a translational overview of how electrophysiology can be used in various fields of neuroscience research.
    
The course will prioritize hands-on experiments. To understand the fundamentals of the electrical properties of a cell membrane and ion transports, a novel setup using a lipid bilayer model will be used. Cellular electrophysiology will be explored using voltage and current-clamp recordings. Long-term potentiation measurements in hippocampal slices will be used to explore the potential of extracellular recordings. Electrophysiological techniques in humans will combine live recordings of the electroencephalogram (EEG) and sensory-evoked brain potentials, clinical neurophysiology case studies, and the use of intracerebral EEG for research. Multi-channel electromyography combined with gait analysis will also be explored. A specific practical session will be devoted to the post-processing techniques used to analyse electrophysiological signals.
The theoretical courses will be concise and delivered alongside each practical. The number of students is limited to 18 participants to allow quality hands-on experience and improve the learning experience.
The teachers will be available throughout the course to answer questions, but also to discuss the potential use of electrophysiology for their research questions.