Developmental and physiological consequences of TR mutations
We extensively used the Cre/loxP technology to analyze the neurodevelopmental function of TH in mouse cerebellum. This showed that TH acts primarily on the GABAergic inhibitory neurons and astrocytes, and only indirectly on other neural cell types. We are trying to generalize this conclusion to other brain areas and to the adult brain. The available models also allow analyzing the consequences of somatic TR mutations restricted to neurons on the general physiology of the mice.
We used CRISPR/Cas9 technology to generate a unique collection of mice with TRα1 mutations, to model a genetic disease which has been recently discovered in human patients, and has pleiotropic consequences on development and physiology.