NCCR-Synapsy

The Synaptic Bases of Mental Diseases

Editorial by Camilla Bellone, Carmen Sandi and Philippe Conus

Dear Colleagues, It is with a profound grief that we are writing the editorial of this issue of the NCCR Synapsy Newsletter. As you certainly all know, Alexandre Dayer, the Director of the NCCR Synapsy tragically passed away on June Read more…


Death of Prof. Alexandre Dayer, NCCR Synapsy director

Dear members of the Synapsy community, It is with great sadness that I have to inform you of the tragic passing of our NCCR Synapsy Director, colleague and friend Alexandre. His passing leaves a huge void in our hearts, our Read more…


The Harmful Effects of Stress Unraveled – Alexandre Dayer

The 12th Synapsy newsletter is rich with interviews and portraits of students, clinical scientists and more senior researchers from the developmental stress working group of Synapsy (work package 4, WP#4). Its objective is to evaluate the long-term effect of exposure Read more…


Joint NCCR Synapsy – IRCN “22q” Workshop, Jul y 6-7, 2019, Tokyo, Japan

This past weekend, a joint NCCR Synapsy-IRCN workshop took place University of Tokyo. Several Synapsy PIs from UNIGE attended and presented their research (Profs. Alexandre Dayer, Stephan Eliez, Marie Schaer, Camila Bellone, Alan Carleton). Copy number variations in chromosome 22q Read more…


Back to the sources of neural diversity

jabaudon_progen

By deciphering the genetic programs of neurons of the cerebral cortex, Swiss and Belgian researchers unravel the mechanisms controlling the genesis of cells in one of the most essential parts of our brain. The cortex is a complex brain region Read more…


Impulsivity increases with severity of childhood trauma in bipolar disorder

impulsivity

In the context of the WP#5, the clinical dimension of impulsivity was studied in people with attention deficit disorder either with or without hyperactivity (ADHD), borderline personality disorder (BPD) or bipolar disorder (BD). This study showed a high level of Read more…


Phase-3 : Synapsy ranked at the top by the SNSF

networking

Entering Phase-3 has been achieved following a long preparatory and competitive process involving coordinated work from NCCR members at all levels. At the end of January 2019, the Synapsy management team received from the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) the Read more…


The fascinating quest for neuronal origins

neuron

Confocal microscopy image showing the embryonic preoptic region, sitting on the brain floor. Cortical neurogliaform cells come from this region that borders the third ventricle (middle, in black), marked by the expression of the transcription factor HMX3 (in red). Researchers Read more…


Unraveling the biological function of a 22q11 locus gene

Aude Chenu-Molinard

Synapsy researchers reveal the developmental function of a new schizophrenia (SZ) risk-gene. The candidate SZ-risk gene DGCR2 is located in the 22q11.2 locus, whose deletion is a major risk factor for SZ. In a recent paper published in Biological Psychiatry, Aude Molinard-Chenu, former MD-PhD Read more…