Objective
The main objective of the proposal is to develop a new easy-to-use tool for in-vitro screening of neurotoxic agents, based on changes/disappearance of electrophysiological activity in acute brain slices and organotypic slice cultures as a consequence of their exposure to neurotoxic agents. The proposal will take advantage of silicon technology by developing a micromachined multi-electrode array to be functionally coupled to brain slices and organotypic slice cultures. Thus allowing multi-site measurements repeatable in time.
The ease of use of the new tool should rely on the design of an optimised measurement micro-chamber for acute brain slices and organotypic brain slices. The core of the microchambe1 will be the array of micro-electrode on which biological samples will lay. This recording /stimulating array will form the bottom of the micro-chamber. The micro-chamber should guarantee the best possible approximation to physiological conditions (Cf. "Central Nervous System Slice Preparations", 3rd Int. Conf., June 1994, J. of Neurosci. Methods, 59, 1, 1995).
Appropriate software / hardware tools will be developed to optimise multi-site recording/stimulation of the electrophysiological signals and their processing in order to "translate" them into a highly reproducible neurotoxicology screening test. The development and use of the new array - based micro-chamber will be paralleled during the proposal by histological, biochemical and standard electrophysiology tests.
Measurable objectives to be achieved in the design of the chambers are:
1) biocompatibility of all the materials in contact with the live neural cell cultures,
2) chemical stability of chosen materials in saline and culture media, 3) automated multi-site recording and stimulation and
4) ease of handling.
The global measurable objective is to provide the European Community with a new tool for in-vitro electrophysiological tests which will reduce animal experiments and become an improved alternative to other time-consuming and expensive in-vitro experiments.
The performances of the micro-chamber will be validated by testing a set of known neurotoxic agents.
Fields of science
Call for proposal
Data not availableFunding Scheme
CSC - Cost-sharing contractsCoordinator
16145 Genova
Italy
See on map
Participants (6)
38640 Claix
See on map
2000 Neuchatel
See on map
2200 Koepenhagen
See on map
5000 Odense
See on map
16132 Genova
See on map
48149 Münster
See on map