Matthew Anderson Lab: Research
Matthew P. Anderson, MD, PhD, is an Assistant Professor and Principal Investigator in the Departments of Neurology and Pathology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, an affiliate of Harvard Medical School. The Anderson Laboratory studies the molecular, cellular and neural network mechanisms responsible for disorders of membrane excitability and synaptic transmission in the central nervous system. Our current neuroscience research focuses on how the normal activity of thalamocortical circuitry is disrupted to produce epilepsy, central pain, and sleep disorders. We have also begun work to investigating the cellular basis for autism.
Our goals are:
- To identify the specific cell types and brain regions that are disrupted to produce epilepsy and autism
- To define physiologic defects in these cells that underlie these disorders
- To identify other candidate proteins responsible for these disorders
- To identify potential targets for new therapies
- Our studies investigate ion channels, transporters, T-type calcium channels, thalamus, cerebral cortex, hippocampus, inherited neurologic disease, inherited psychiatric disease, epilepsy, and autism
- Our experimental methods include: embryonic stem cell homologous recombination, transgenic mice, GFP labeled neurons, Cre recombinase, Flp recombinase, BAC homologous recombination, lambda red recombinase, brain slice recording, current clamp, voltage clamp, patch-clamp electrophysiology, single channel recording, infrared guided whole-cell recording, cDNA cloning, siRNA, and region-restricted and conditional mouse genetics
- Our team applies state-of-the-art experimental techniques to study these complex mechanisms. Our techniques include the production of genetically engineered mice to target inherited neurologic disease genes to specific neuronal or glial cell-types to identify the cellular locus of disease. We employ methods such as EEG and EMG recording to measure the behavioral disorders of epilepsy and sleep in mice. To measure defects in single neurons, including synaptic and firing properties, we use whole-cell, patch-clamp electrophysiology recording techniques in the acute brain slice from adult mice. We are actively recording now from the thalamus, cortex, and amygdala.
