Huib Mansvelder: Shining light on the brain
In corridor C of the building of the Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences, Huib Mansvelder gives a tour through a series of rooms filled from top to bottom with imaging equipment of all kinds imaginable. Most microscopes and computers are switched off. ‘It’s quiet now, but this afternoon most stations will be manned. Most of us like to make our samples in the morning and study them in the afternoon. Brain tissue can be held alive for a day, that’s why.’
Both skilled as a neuroscientist and in using optical techniques, Mansvelder is program leader for Photonics and life cell imaging, together with Marloes Groot. Groot, who is part of the Laser Center, specialises in the technical aspects of imaging, while Mansvelder is more on the neurology side of the program.
Mansvelder heads the Department of Integrative Neurophysiology, which consists of five research teams. He and his colleagues study the brain at all different levels: isolated brain cells, slices of brain tissue and the whole brain. A brain is more than the sum of its parts, Mansvelder says. ‘In the brain of a living animal, there is a lot more going on than in a 300 m m thick slice of tissue. These emergent properties make it so interesting to study the human brain, which is our eventual goal.’
Mansvelder’s department is a very complete one, he says. ‘We have clinical, molecular and psychological researchers. We even have a bio-informatician integrated within our group. I don’t believe in departments that are merely theoretical. You should always test your model with reality.’
The research efforts at Mansvelder’s department are very diverse. As an example, he cites Klaus Linkenkaer’s recent study on time structure of brainwaves of people with Alzheimer’s disease. ‘He observed some remarkable changes in their EEGs. This could be a very useful biomarker for early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s.’
In other research, Mansvelder and colleagues study closely the effect of addictive substances such as heroin and nicotine. What precise changes take place in the brain when exposed to these substances over a long period of time? They found that the cues associated with heroin taking in ‘clean’ animals caused changes in the synapses in the prefrontal cortex, which led to relapse behaviour. A broad team of scientists worked together on this, resulting in a Nature Neuroscience publication Mansvelder is very proud of.
‘Multidisciplinarity seems to be a must in science today. It’s almost a cliché to bring it up, but at the same time, I believe this is what can make the Neuroscience Campus really strong. We can do things that were unimaginable before. It is what I have always tried to achieve within my own department, but the reality is you cannot have everything. But with the Neuroscience Campus, we can. Therefore, I’m a big supporter of the ideas behind the Campus.’
