Position

Wellcome Professor of Pharmacology

Areas of Expertise within the Group

Neuroscience; Synaptic physiology and pharmacology; Neuronal networks; Neocortex; Hippocampus; Interneurones; Neuronal morphology; Biocytin/HRP; Immuno-cytochemistry and Immuno-fluorescence, Electron microscopy, Dual and triple intracellular and whole cell recordings from adult brain slices; Neuronal and network modelling.

Biography

Following a BSc in Physiology at Bedford College, University of London (1975), Alex moved to the Physiology Department in Bristol to study for her PhD with Dr Tony Ridge. After two postdoctoral years in the Anatomy Department in Bristol, she moved to the University Laboratory of Physiology in Oxford in 1980 with a Beit Memorial Fellowship, joining Somerville College as a Fulford Junior Research Fellow in 1982.

In 1985 Alex moved to the Physiology Department, University College Cardiff, as a Wellcome Lecturer. Here the paired intracellular recordings from synaptically connected cortical neurones that have become the hallmark of the lab began. She moved to the Department of Physiology, Royal Free Hospital Medical School, in 1988, again as a Wellcome Lecturer, becoming Professor of Neurophysiology at the newly combined Royal Free and University College Medical School in 1998. In 2002, Professor Thomson moved to The School of Pharmacy as Head of the Pharmacology Department.

Professional Activities

Editorial Board : Neuroscience (1990-)

Editorial Board : Cerebral Cortex (1998-)

Editorial Board : Thalamus & Related Systems (2000-)

Receiving Editor : European Journal of Neuroscience (2002-2007)

Receiving Editor : Brain Cell Biology (2005-)

Assistant Chief Editor: Frontiers in Neuroscience http://frontiersin.org/

Ordinary Member: MRC Neuroscience and Mental Health Board (2007-)

Current Research

The group continues to study the synaptic circuitry of neocortex and hippocampus and the pre- and post-synaptic determination and localization of function. Dual/triple intracellular recordings with pharmacology and biocytin-labelling of connected neurones in slices of neocortex and hippocampus detail the properties of synaptic connections and investigate the underlying mechanisms. Parallel morphological analyses investigate the specificity with which cells of a particular class in a given layer select target neurones in the same and other cortical layers.

We belong to two large consortia who will use these circuit data to build models that emulate cortical structure and function, first as computational models in software, then in novel chip designs:

EPSRC funded COLAMN "A Novel Computing Architecture for Cognitive Systems based on the Laminar Microcircuitry of the Neocortex ". Instigator Prof. Mike Denham, Coordinator Dr. Thomas Wennekers (Centre for Theoretical and Computational Neuroscience, The University of Plymouth).

EU FP6 funded "Fast Analog Computing with Emergent Transient States in Neural Architectures" "FACETS" Coordinator Dr Karlheinz Meier, Heidelberg.

Other Projects

Microcircuitry of the neocortex

Inter-laminar connections in neocortex

Pharmacological identification of the GABA_A receptor subunits utilised by specific inhibitory connections in neocortex, in collaboration with Afia Ali and using novel subunit-specific ligands developed by MSD.

Continuing studies of the unique morphological and physiological characteristics of interneurones in the CA2 sub-field of the hippocampus, first demonstrated by Audrey Mercer.

Electrical coupling between pyramidal cells in CA1 and in neocortex

The group is funded by the MRC, Novartis Pharma (Basel), the EPSRC and EU FP6

Current Members of the Group

Name	Post Title
Dr Karine Abitbol	Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Mr Antoine Bremaud	PhD Student
Dr Caroline Hatchett	Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Mr Jonathan Iball	Techinician
Miss Claire Shooter	Technician
Dr David West	Technical Consultant

Internal Collaborators:

Dr Afia Ali - Independent Senior Research Fellow

Dr Audrey Mercer - RCUK Academic Research Fellow

A new collaboration with Dr's A Ali, K Harvey, J Jovanovic, A Mercer, B Pearce and Prof's R Harvey and FA Stephenson, recently funded by the MRC and entitled : " Mechanisms underlying synapse-specific clustering of GABA_A receptors".

Fuentealba P, Begum R, Capogna M, Jinno S, Márton LF, Csicsvari J, Thomson AM, Somogyi P, Klausberger T (2008) Ivy Cells: A population of nitric-oxide-producing, slow-spiking GABAergic neurons and their involvement in hippocampal network activity. Neuron 57:917-29. Publication Link

Ali AB, Thomson AM (2008) Synaptic alpha5 subunit containing GABA(A) receptors mediate IPSPs elicited by dendrite-targeting cells in rat neocortex.  Cereb. Cortex 18:1260-71.
doi:10.1093/cercor/bhm160
http://cercor.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/bhm160?ijkey=CRYo0hBzYzh5PuE&keytype=ref

Mercer A, Trigg H, Thomson AM (2007) Characterisation of interneurones in the CA2 subfield of the adult rat hippocampus. J. Neurosci. Jul 4;27(27):7329-38.
doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1829-07.2007
www.jneurosci.org/cgi/content/full/27/27/7329

Bremaud A, West DC, Thomson AM (2007) Binomial parameters differ across neocortical layers and with different classes of connections in adult rat and cat neocortex. PNAS 104(35):14134-9
Supporting Material : www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/0705661104/DC1

Mercer A, Bannister AP, Thomson AM (2007) Electrical coupling between pyramidal cells in adult cortical regions. J. Neurocytol.  [Brain Cell Biology] 35 : 13-27
[in press DOI:10.1007/s11068-006-9005-9]
www.springerlink.com/content/y7612442p2036653/fulltext.html

Thomson AM, Lamy C. Functional maps of neocortical local circuitry (2007) Frontiers in Neuroscience 1: 19-42.
frontiersin.org/neuroscience/abstract/10.3389/neuro.01/1.1.002.2007

Thomson AM (2007) Local circuit connections in thalamo-recipient layers. Thalamus and Related Systems. 3 (3): 217-226 [in press doi:10.1017/S1472928807000246] Published online by Cambridge University Press 26 Mar 2007.   For abstract