NBIP researcher Prof. Patrice Mollard (CNRS, Montpellier, France) and his team have published a study in PNAS which has been highlighted by F1000Prime faculty members 'In this fascinating study, Mollard and collaborators combine different techniques to provide functional and morphological evidence of a passive diffusion route through fenestrated blood vessels for the appetite-regulating hormone ghrelin to reach its target neurons in the hypothalamic arcuate nucleus'.

Prof Mollard has previously developed a new in vivo imaging technique to combine multiphoton microscopy with a long-working distance objective. By combining complex microsurgical approaches in transgenic mice with analytical imaging tools the group can visualise real time sub cellular interaction and obtain detailed information on the microvasculature and extravasation of fluorescent molecules within the brain.

Read the full article here. Details of the paper are below.

Rapid sensing of circulating ghrelin by hypothalamic appetite-modifying neurons.
Schaeffer M, Langlet F, Lafont C, Molino F, Hodson DJ, Roux T, Lamarque L, Verdié P, Bourrier E, Dehouck B, Banères JL, Martinez J, Méry PF, Marie J, Trinquet E, Fehrentz JA, Prévot V, Mollard P.

Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Unité Mixte de Recherche 5203, Institut de Génomique Fonctionnelle, F-34000 Montpellier, France.

PNAS: 2013 Jan 22;110(4):1512-7. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1212137110. Epub 2013 Jan 7