Alex Chen
@alexbchen
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PhD student Harvard @EngertLab, @HHMIJanelia Ahrens lab; searching for the molecular, cellular, and circuit underpinnings of behavior | 🏊🏼♂️🚴🏼🏃🏻 | he/him
Boston, MA
Joined August 2017
Excited to share that the astrocyte-centered half of my thesis work is now out @ScienceMagazine! With @MishaAhrens @marcduque3 .1/8.
science.org
Both neurons and glia communicate through diffusible neuromodulators; however, how neuron-glial interactions in such neuromodulatory networks influence circuit computation and behavior is unclear....
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Check out this great article from @_TheTransmitter on our recent paper and related work!
thetransmitter.org
Astrocytes serve as crucial mediators of neuromodulatory processes previously attributed to direct communication between neurons, four new studies show.
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RT @NBellono: @CoreyAHAllard et al asks how “solar-powered” slugs maintain stolen chloroplasts from their diet for photosynthesis and starv….
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RT @MBLScience: Please help us welcome the 2025 Grass Fellows! The Grass Fellowship program brings early-career investigators to the MBL to….
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RT @yaochen20: 🧠 Curious about neuromodulator interactions or how sleep works its magic? Apply to our lab @WashUMedNeuro as a postdoc to br….
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RT @yulonglilab: Excited to share our Science paper on HaloDA1.0-the first genetically encoded far-red dopamine sensor! 🥳It enables powerfu….
science.org
Dopamine (DA) plays a crucial role in a variety of brain functions through intricate interactions with other neuromodulators and intracellular signaling pathways. However, studying these complex...
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RT @DombrovskiMark: Excited to share that the second half of my postdoctoral research is now published in @Nature . We used the fruit fly b….
nature.com
Nature - Gradients of cell recognition molecules wire a sensorimotor interface in Drosophila.
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Super cool work!.
Congratulations to our Human Neural Circuitry team; publishes today in Science! This was the hardest challenge of my career, but one of the most rewarding, after years of rebuilding– & for myself, expanding my inpatient neuropsychiatry work to the service
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Shoutout @marcduque3.
Congratulations to the Rising Stars in Neuroscience – Class of 2025! This is one of my favorite events each year, and this year was no exception. Keep an eye on this incredible group of scientists—they’re doing amazing things!
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RT @ScienceMagazine: Three new papers in Science report that astrocytes are indispensable for neuromodulatory signaling across diverse neur….
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Repping my @hasanthehun merch🙂↕️.
New Stars in Neural Circuits: Astrocytes Guide Brain State Changes @alexbchen @marcduque3 @EngertLab @MishaAhrens @HarvardGSAS @Harvard @RachelleGaudet @harvardmed @HHMIJanelia
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RT @HHMIJanelia: ✨Once thought to play a supporting function in the brain, new research led by @alexbchen & @MishaAhrens shows non-neuronal….
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RT @papouinlab: Delighted to see not one, not two, but three papers about astrocytes in Science today! Here's our contribution to that coll….
science.org
Locus ceruleus (LC)–derived norepinephrine (NE) drives network and behavioral adaptations to environmental saliencies by reconfiguring circuit functional connectivity, but the underlying synapse-le...
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RT @EricTopol: Astrocytes have long been conceived as passive support player cells in the brain. But today @ScienceMagazine (via 3 reports….
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Finally, stay tuned for other part of my thesis work, covering all of the other non-astrocyte cells in the brain, called neurons! Fish connectome dropping hopefully before GTA VI.
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The year of the astrocyte continues 😌
2025 will be the year of astrocytes 😌.
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Finally, thank you to @c_eroglu.for the wonderful perspective piece highlighting all three papers! /end.
science.org
Astrocyte signaling pathways influence neuronal networks and behavioral responses to neuromodulators
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It appears possible that an ancient role for the NAP motif may have been to implement inhibition to counteract prolonged, perhaps runaway excitation. Nevertheless, continuing to identify circuits and behavioral contexts recruiting this pathway is an exciting future direction. 7/8.
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In our study, the NAP motif seems to mediate feedforward inhibition: it is activated by contexts requiring strong activation of circuits during futility-induced struggle to prevent prolonged futile struggling. 6/8.
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That similar pathways exist in flies, fish, and mammals suggests the existence of an evolutionarily conserved, canonical norepinephrine-astrocyte-purinergic signaling motif (NAP motif?) 5/8.
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