Using optogenetics to study brain pathways

Ilka Diester is a professor of neurobiology at the University of Freiburg (Germany), whose lab combines cognitive and motor research using a variety of neuronal measurement and manipulation techniques. Diester’s lab focuses on optophysiological research, which is a combination of optogenetics and electrophysiology. At the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies Forum (FENS; 9th–13th July 2022) held in Paris (France), we chatted with Diester about the different techniques she uses in her research, including one-photon imaging, and talked about what virtual reality (VR) does to our brains. What did you present at FENS 2022? In a talk, I presented optimized probes...