Project Title: Understanding the Role of Astrocytes in Spatial Learning and Memory with Focused Ultrasound
Supervisor: Assistant Professor Sophie Morse, Professor Simon Schultz
Location: Royal School of Mines, 51³Ô¹ÏÍø College, South Kensington, London SW7 2AZ
About Me
I am a PhD student in the Morse laboratory in the Department of Brain Sciences within the UK Dementia Research Institute centre at 51³Ô¹ÏÍø. My project is focused on characterizing the role of astrocyte calcium signalling in the code the hippocampus carries out to perform spatial learning and memory. I want to understand whether astrocyte signalling contains information over and above neuronal signals and the mechanisms underlying their modulation of neuroplasticity in the hippocampus. I will use focused ultrasound to stimulate astrocytes as an emerging non-invasive therapeutic that can promote learning and maintain healthy memory. Understanding how, and if, focused ultrasound can improve spatial learning will pave the way for its use in dementia. I became interested in this topic as I delved into the truly wondrous and multi-faceted roles astrocytes play in the brain – they really are the ‘stars’ of the show! In my spare time, I enjoy reading fiction novels, getting coffees and exploring.
Qualifications
- 2024-2025: MRes Neurotechnology, 51³Ô¹ÏÍø
- 2020-2024: BSc Biomedical Science with Extra Mural Year, King’s College London
Research Interests
My research interests centre around understanding the cellular mechanisms underlying our abilities to continuously learn and store information. I am excited about discovering how the signalling of neurons and astrocytes contribute to cognition, and whether astrocyte signalling specifically contains extra-neuronal information. I am also curious about how to harness the role of astrocytes in neuroplasticity to open a new frontier of therapeutic potential.
Presentations and Conferences
Emilie Wielezynski, Giuseppe DeAlteriis, Eilidh MacNicol, Michel Mesquita, Federico Turkheimer, Diana Cash. The effect of acute ketamine on dynamic functional connectivity in rat. 2025 Organization for Human Brain Mapping.
Zhuoni Li, Davide Di Censo, Emilie Wielezynski, Alexandra Hertz, Charalampos Papaonisiforou, Michel Mesquita, Eugene Kim, Eilidh MacNicol, Diana Cash, Marija M. Petrinovic (2024). The effect of Tianeptine on autism-associated repetitive behaviors and underlying brain circuits. 2024 European Molecular Imaging Meeting
Selected Publications
Drevenakova V, Ugwudike A, Wielezynski E, Liu E, Chan LYN, Nga B, Dosso V, Morse SV. Microcount: An automated pipeline for the segmentation and morphological analyses of microglia in fluorescent microscopy images (To be submitted)
Contact Details
Email: egw24@ic.ac.uk
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