Eric Bur­guiere

Translational approach to studying compulsive behaviors: Promise and limitations of animal models in psychiatry

Trans­la­tion­al approach to study­ing com­pul­sive behav­iors: Promise and lim­i­ta­tions of ani­mal mod­els in psychiatry

Abstract

Our research group has a trans­la­tion­al approach, which aim at study­ing the neu­ro­phys­i­o­log­i­cal and behav­ioral aspects of repet­i­tive behav­iors in human and mouse mod­els. We are espe­cial­ly inter­est­ed in study­ing how cor­ti­co-basal gan­glia loops under­lie the reg­u­la­tion of these process­es in ani­mal mod­els (e.g. SAPA­P3-KO mice) and patients (e.g. obses­sive-com­pul­sive dis­or­ders (OCD), Tourette) suf­fer­ing from patho­log­i­cal repet­i­tive behav­iors. Indeed, repet­i­tive behav­iors are the hall­mark of these neu­ropsy­chi­atric dis­or­ders, which offer a unique oppor­tu­ni­ty to explore the neu­ro­bi­o­log­i­cal mech­a­nism under­ly­ing their regulation. 

We aim at prob­ing these neur­al cir­cuits by using neu­ro­phys­i­o­log­i­cal record­ing and/​or mod­u­lat­ing their activ­i­ty with elec­tric or opto­ge­net­ic neu­ro­mod­u­la­tion. This trans­la­tion­al approach is espe­cial­ly promis­ing for bet­ter under­stand­ing the behav­ioral dimen­sion and neu­ro­phys­i­o­log­i­cal sub­strates under­ly­ing repet­i­tive behav­iours, but also to devel­op inno­v­a­tive ther­a­peu­tic strate­gies based on inva­sive neu­rostim­u­la­tion or tar­get­ed phar­ma­co­log­i­cal intervention.

Biog­ra­phy

Eric Bur­guière, PhD, leads the “Neu­ro­phys­i­ol­o­gy of Repet­i­tive Behav­iors (NERB)” research group sit­u­at­ed at the Paris Brain Insti­tute, acces­si­ble at https://​nerb​.team/. The research group devel­opped a trans­ver­sal approach using ani­mal mod­els in com­ple­ment with clin­i­cal work..

Eric Bur­guière has been trained as a neu­ro­phys­i­ol­o­gist spe­cial­ized in behav­ior, neu­ronal record­ing and chemo/​optogenetic approach­es with rodent mod­els. Along his sci­en­tif­ic career he spe­cial­ized in devel­op­ing inno­v­a­tive par­a­digms to study behav­iour­al adap­ta­tion and reg­u­la­tion. He stud­ied mouse mod­els of dis­or­ders of motor and cog­ni­tive func­tions. Impor­tant­ly, he became an expert in patho­phys­i­ol­o­gy of repet­i­tive behav­iors, notably with some recent work on com­pul­sive behav­iors of a mouse mod­el of OCD-spec­trum dis­or­der (Bur­guière et al., Sci­ence 2013).

Recent­ly, Eric Bur­guière devel­oped with his research group some inno­v­a­tive approach­es that they can mod­u­late spe­cif­ic brain activ­i­ties in a closed-loop design, either at rest or with­in a task (Mon­drag­on, Schrei­weis, Bur­guière, BioRx­iv, 2022). They devel­oped inno­v­a­tive oper­ant cham­bers where mice are per­form­ing com­plex cog­ni­tive tasks while their social, cir­ca­di­an and cog­ni­tive behav­iours are mon­i­tored auto­mat­i­cal­ly and con­tin­u­ous­ly using mul­ti­ple sen­sors (Ben­z­i­na et al., 2021).