Serotonin research with focus on 5-HT7 receptor

Coordinator of the consortium: Séverine Morisset-Lopez, Center for Molecular Biophysics (CBM) - FR

Summary

Science is necessarily an international endeavor. Some of the best advances in ideas, techniques, models, etc are born when people come together to work on a common problem. Séverine Morisset-Lopez, group leader at the Center for Molecular biophysics (CNRS) in Orléans, has formed a multi-disciplinary consortium, which brings together senior scientists in the fields of synthetic chemistry and molecular modeling (Andrzej Bojarski, Poland), pharmacology (Michael Bader, Germany), immunology (Eva Latorre, Spain), vascular research (Stephanie Watts, US) and neurosciences (S Morisset-Lopez, France) with strong expertise in 5-HT physiology. This interdisciplinary is a key factor of this application which can cover broad aspects of the pharmacology and physiopathology of this receptor. Within this application, the common theme is building a world-wide understanding of the 5-HT7 receptor and having a wider knowledge into therapeutic development. For that purpose, the first objective is to create the first and comprehensive website dedicated to the 5-HT7 serotonin receptor (expression, pharmacology, physiology, involvement in human diseases, cell and animal’s models). This would make it possible to reinforce and share a wide range of information on this receptor, available not only to academic researchers and clinicians but also to private companies. The second objective is to host a meeting early in the 2nd year of the consortium that brings together these 5-HT7R researchers. The purpose of this meeting will be sharing 5-HT7R science but also vetting and improving the developmental website. In this way, this website will belong to all (an international effort). At the end, the project will enable to increase the visibility of consortium’s members and their researches on both serotonin system and 5-HT7R. This project will definitively boost the scientific excellence of not only the host laboratory in the Centre Val de Loire Region in France but also the foreign laboratories involved in this consortium and will also give the opportunity for further international funding applications.