Living in the cold - what we can learn from a hibernator
Mar. 16, 2021 10:00 - 11:00
Category
Seminar
Place
Other
Venue
Online seminar
Speaker
Dr. Wei Li
Affiliation
National Eye Institute (NEI), National Institutes of Health (NIH), Bethesda, MD, USA
Poster
Summary
This seminar is a part of the QMIN project seminar series.
Hibernation is a fascinating biological phenomenon. Mammalian hibernators have evolved sophisticated survival mechanisms designed to cope with extremely stressful conditions that would be life-threatening to non-hibernators. However, the mechanisms of such promising protective mechanisms remain elusive, hindering potential clinical applications. We use thirteen-lined ground squirrel as an animal model to study adaptive strategies during hibernation focusing on the central nervous system. In this seminar, I will report adaptations that we observed in synapse, cytoskeleton, and local immune response from hibernating ground squirrels. Exploiting the knowledge of such adaptations in hibernation can facilitate the development of new therapeutic strategies for neuroprotection against neural injury and neurodegeneration.
Host
Genshiro Sunagawa