Viviana Gradinaru

Viviana Grădinaru (born 1981) is a Romanian-American neuroscientist who is Professor of Neuroscience at the California Institute of Technology. She develops technologies for brain imaging, including optogenetics and CLARITY, to understand reward and sleep. She has been awarded the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers and the National Institutes of Health Director's Pioneer Award. In 2019 she was a finalist for the Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists. In 2020 she was awarded a Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Biomedical Science by the Vilcek Foundation.[1]

Viviana Gradinaru
Gradinaru among recipients of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) in 2016
Born
Vaslui, Romania
Alma materStanford University (PhD)
California Institute of Technology (BS)
University of Bucharest
AwardsVilcek Prize
Scientific career
InstitutionsCalifornia Institute of Technology
Circuit Therapeutics
ThesisMechanisms of deep brain stimulation revealed by optogenetic deconstruction of diseased brain circuitry (2010)
Doctoral advisorKarl Deisseroth
InfluencesFrances Arnold

Early life and education

Gradinaru is a native of Vaslui, Romania,[2] and grew up with her grandparents in a small village.[3] As a child, her grandparents and the rest of her community would work together to solve local problems.[3] As a native of Eastern Europe, Gradinaru was encouraged to study science from a young age, and took part in science olympiads.[3] She has said that she benefitted from the many "brilliant women teaching and practicing science in my home country".[3] Gradinaru eventually studied physics at the University of Bucharest. After two years she moved to the California Institute of Technology and graduated in biology in 2005.[4] During her undergraduate studies she became fascinated by neurodegeneration.[5] She moved to Stanford University for her doctoral studies, where she specialised in neuroscience under the supervision of Karl Deisseroth.[4] During her PhD research she taught summer courses at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and trained researchers for the Stanford Optogenetics Innovation Laboratory.[6] She took part in ballroom dancing and competed in quickstep at an amateur level throughout graduate school.[7]

Research and career

In collaboration with her colleagues at Stanford, Gradinaru founded Circuit Therapeutics, serving as the chief technology officer and creating optogenetic therapies to treat people with disorders of the nervous system.[7][8] Gradinaru joined the faculty at the California Institute of Technology, first as a Visiting Researcher, then Assistant Professor in 2012 and was eventually promoted to full Professor in 2018.[9] Since 2017 she has served as the Principal Investigator of the CLARITY, Optogenetics and Vector Engineering Research (CLOVER) Center at the California Institute of Technology.[10]

Gradinaru has worked on the development of novel technologies for brain imaging, which she uses to understand sleep disorders and movement.[9] These technologies include optogenetics and CLARITY. She developed viral vector screening methods to monitor gene delivery vehicles that can cross the blood–brain barrier.[11] Optogenetics make use of light and photosensitive proteins to manipulate the function of cells that live within heterogenous body tissue.

She looks to use her understanding of neuronal activity to establish the mechanism of action of deep brain stimulation (DBS), as well as looking at the long-term impacts of DBS on neuronal function.[6][12] In particular she has used optogenetics to study the brain circuitry involved with Parkinson's disease.[13] Using CLARITY Gradinaru looks to create anatomical maps of intact brain networks and biological systems.[14][15] In 2019 Gradinaru was part of a research team that demonstrated that zebrafish and mice need serotonin to sleep.[16]

Awards and honours

Publications
  • Gradinaru, Viviana (26 December 2007). "Targeting and Readout Strategies for Fast Optical Neural Control In Vitro and In Vivo". Journal of Neuroscience. 27 (52): 14231–14238. doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3578-07.2007. PMID 18160630.
  • Gradinaru, Viviana (17 April 2009). "Optical Deconstruction of Parkinsonian Neural Circuitry". Science. 324 (5925): 354–359. doi:10.1126/science.1167093. PMC 6744370. PMID 19299587.
  • Gradinaru, Viviana (2 April 2010). "Molecular and Cellular Approaches for Diversifying and Extending Optogenetics". Cell. 141: 22–24. doi:10.1016/j.cell.2010.02.037. PMC 4160532. PMID 20303157.
gollark: What would it even mean?
gollark: Automatically coalesce mods? How?
gollark: Yes, but those are stupid.
gollark: It was just a screenshot from factorio.
gollark: A PNG which is somehow 3MB.

References
  1. "Viviana Gradinaru". Vilcek Foundation. Retrieved 3 February 2020.
  2. "O vasluiancă de excepţie: Viviana Grădinaru, omul de ştiinţă care a revoluţionat cercetarea medicală, creând şoarecii transparenţi". adevarul.ro. Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  3. "Here Are the Women Shaping the Future of Science | Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists". blavatnikawards.org. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  4. "Gradinaru Receives NIH Director's Award". www.caltech.edu. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  5. Griswold, Ann (2017). "The Innovators In Science Award Honorees Are Breaking New Ground In Neuroscience". NYAS. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  6. "Viviana Gradinaru". alleninstitute.org. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  7. Elsevier. "Q&A with Dr. Viviana Gradinaru of @Caltech biology: Quickstep from start-up to academia". Elsevier Connect. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  8. "Optogenética: controlar nuestro cerebro mediante luz". Blogthinkbig.com (in Spanish). 22 April 2013. Retrieved 24 January 2020.
  9. "Viviana Gradinaru: The Division of Biology and Biological Engineering". www.bbe.caltech.edu. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  10. "Home - Caltech CLOVER Center". www.clover.caltech.edu. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  11. "Viviana Gradinaru, PhD | The Vallee Foundation". www.thevalleefoundation.org. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  12. "People - Caltech CLOVER Center". www.clover.caltech.edu. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  13. House, P.A. (January 2009). "Optical Deconstruction of Parkinsonian Neural Circuitry". Yearbook of Neurology and Neurosurgery. 2009: 214–215. doi:10.1016/s0513-5117(09)79065-9. ISSN 0513-5117.
  14. Treweek, Jennifer B; Chan, Ken Y; Flytzanis, Nicholas C; Yang, Bin; Deverman, Benjamin E; Greenbaum, Alon; Lignell, Antti; Xiao, Cheng; Cai, Long; Ladinsky, Mark S; Bjorkman, Pamela J (2015). "Whole-body tissue stabilization and selective extractions via tissue-hydrogel hybrids for high-resolution intact circuit mapping and phenotyping". Nature Protocols. 10 (11): 1860–1896. doi:10.1038/nprot.2015.122. ISSN 1754-2189. PMC 4917295. PMID 26492141.
  15. Chung, Kwanghun; Wallace, Jenelle; Kim, Sung-Yon; Kalyanasundaram, Sandhiya; Andalman, Aaron S.; Davidson, Thomas J.; Mirzabekov, Julie J.; Zalocusky, Kelly A.; Mattis, Joanna; Denisin, Aleksandra K.; Pak, Sally (2013). "Structural and molecular interrogation of intact biological systems". Nature. 497 (7449): 332–337. doi:10.1038/nature12107. ISSN 1476-4687. PMC 4092167. PMID 23575631.
  16. "Settling the debate on serotonin's role in sleep: The brain chemical is necessary to get enough sleep". ScienceDaily. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  17. "Viviana Gradinaru, PhD". The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research | Parkinson's Disease. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  18. "Viviana Gradinaru, Ph.D." Pew Trusts. Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  19. "Innovators in Science Award Honorees". www.takeda.com. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  20. "Past Awardees: Symposium & Award Ceremony: Gill Center for Biomolecular Science: Indiana University Bloomington". Gill Center for Biomolecular Science. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
  21. "National Finalists | Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists". blavatnikawards.org. Retrieved 20 January 2020.
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