PhD in development of optical endoscopy for deep brain imaging

The methods of holographic endoscopy have recently emerged as a powerful platform to introduce sub-cellular resolution microscopy deep inside tissues of living organisms, including brain. Our laboratory of Complex Photonics (lead by Prof. Čižmár, https://www.isibrno.cz/cs/komplexni-fotonika) has been developing cutting edge multi-mode fibre based endoscopes and applying them in brain imaging in animal models in vivo. These minimally-invasive endoscopes can reach deep subcortical locations in the brain which are not accessible by other optical methods of similar resolution.

This PhD work will focus on expanding the capabilities of the system with two new modalities: optical manipulation of cells using optogenetics and extracellular electrophysiological recordings. Optogenetics is a unique tool that enables manipulation of cellular activity with light. Electrophysilogy has been a golden standard method of neuroscience for the past fifty years which allows recordings of local field potentials (LFP) and multi-unit activity (MUA) of neurons. Uniquely, these modalities will be implemented within the same thin endoscopic probe which serves for imaging. Implementation of electrophysiology will be carried out in collaboration with Prof. Massimo de Vittorio and Dr. Ferruccio Pisanello (Instituto Italiano de Technologia).