Units

Institute of Interdisciplinary Research in human and molecular Biology

IRIBHM is part of the Medical School of the Univerité Libre de Bruxelles (ULB) and one of the largest research structures of the university.
Founded in the nineteen sixties with the aim of applying an interdisciplinary approach to the study of thyroid pathophysiology, the Institute has thrived over the years into a number of independent groups with diversifying research interests. Presently, about 130 researchers and technicians are working in the Institute over a range of subjects encompassing signal transduction, development, neuroscience, and cancer, using cell and molecular biology approaches. Staff researchers include physicians, physicists, bioinformaticians, (bio)chemists and biologists. The activities of IRIBHM are mainly taking place on the Erasme campus of ULB, in the suburb of Brussels, although the Institute also contributes to the Institut de Biologie Moléculaire et Médicale (IBMM) on the Gosselies campus. The heavy equipment is common to the whole Institute and often shared with other groups of the campus as technical platforms. This includes genomics, proteomics, transgenesis, FACS and confocal microscopy facilities.

Projetcs

Transgenesis

The IRIBHM has developped a mouse transgenic facility in the latest eighties. Addition transgenesis, by microinjection of DNA constructs into fertilized mouse eggs, and gene replacement, resulting from the genetic manipulation of embryonic stem cells (ES), are available in the institute. These techniques have been used to generate models of thyroid diseases and to study the role in vivo of G protein coupled receptors, signalling proteins and factors involved in axonal guidance

Molecular and cellular biology of brain development

The cerebral cortex is one of the most complex and important structures in our brain. The mechanisms of formation of the cortex have direct relevance to several diseases, such as epilepsy and mental disorders, as well as for the development of rationally designed cell therapies for neurological conditions. Our major goal is to understand better the genetic mechanisms controlling the development of the cerebral cortex, from stem cells to neuronal networks. Our main experimental model is the mouse, where we combine molecular and cellular approaches to study cortical development, both in vivo (using mouse transgenesis and in utero electroporation) and in vitro (using organotypic assays). In other projects centered on human cortex development we try to identify genes that underly the development and evolution of human-specific features in our brain. Finally, using mouse and human embryonic stem (ES) cells, we are developing methods to produce specific types of cortical neurons, and to generate in vitro models of human neuronal diseases.