The goals of the St-Pierre lab are to design, characterize, and deploy protein tools to accelerate neuroscience research and broader applications. We focus on the development of genetically encoded fluorescent markers/sensors and optogenetic actuators. 

The complexity of the brain makes it challenging to study. For example, mouse brains contain 10  neurons and as many (or more) glia.  Neurons on average have ~8,000 synapses from other cells. Through changes in membrane voltage, neurons process and communicate these inputs to other cells on a millisecond timescale. Disruption of this tightly controlled process is thought to be involved in many neurological disorders. Thus, one of the long-standing goals in neuroscience is to perform all-optical electrophysiology or multi-color imaging. Either of these methods would enable large-scale monitoring/manipulation of neural activity non-invasively with cell type-specificity. To further accelerate the development of optical sensors and actuators, the need arises for high-throughput protein engineering and screening methods. Regulated expression of these new tools will also be critical to prevent toxic overexpression in some cells and sub-detection levels in others.