New Optical Probes Bring Dopamine to Light

Abraham G. Beyene,† Kristen Delevich,‡ Sarah J. Yang,† and Markita P. Landry*,†,§,∥,⊥ †Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States ‡Department of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720-1650, United States Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3), Berkeley, California 94720-3220, United States Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, San Francisco, California 94158, United States C signaling between neurons in the brain can be divided into two major categories: fast synaptic transmission and neuromodulation. Fast synaptic transmission, mediated by amino acids such as glutamate and GABA, occurs on millisecond time scales and results in the influx of ions through ligand-gated ion channels on postsynaptic neurons (Figure 1A). Electrophysiological and optical imaging tools,