Blue Line, Blue Ridge, Go Blue!

By Elise Savier Assistant Professor, Molecular & Integrative Physiology Joined MIP Faculty in July 2022

Originally from the Northeast part of France, I grew up in a rural area, surrounded by the Vosges mountain range, which is nicknamed the “Blue Line”. I've always been intrigued by animal behaviors and how they are generated, may that be from environmental pressures or internal drives. During high school, I followed the Biology curriculum and attempted medical school, which in France starts right after graduation. This didn’t work out for me, so I was redirected to a two-year degree as a medical lab technician at the University of Nancy in France. I learned many different lab techniques, from HPLC, to the identification of bacteria, to pharmacology. These two years were extremely formative and gave me a solid technical foundation. I did my final internship in a research lab, which really triggered a vocation. With this technical toolkit, I was ready to explore fundamental biological questions. I was interested in answering two questions: the origin of life and the origin of consciousness (reality has caught up with me since!). I decided to go back to university and pursue a Bachelor in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry.

I got an opportunity to reconcile my passion for animal behavior with my undergrad training when I joined the Joint Master in Neuroscience at the University of Strasbourg. Most of the cohort was international and some of our classes were in Switzerland and Germany, which created a unique learning environment. The last semester was dedicated to research and I joined Dr. Reber’s lab for my Master’s thesis. My goal was to further characterize a mouse strain that presented Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)-like symptoms such as impulsivity and increased distractibility. The phenotype of this mouse strain originates from an alteration in the connectivity of the superior colliculus, a structure involved in detecting visual stimuli that “pop-out” and may require our immediate attention. We identified an increase in norepinephrine levels in the superior colliculus of these mice, an imbalance also observed in patients with ADHD.

In 2013, I obtained a grant from the French Ministry of Research to pursue a PhD. I chose to stay in Dr. Reber’s lab at the University of Strasbourg to investigate how axon guidance molecules organize the connections in different brain regions involved in vision and form so-called maps, which recapitulate the relative position of visual information in the environment in the brain. We discovered that a molecule expressed in the retina is used to guide the alignment of the map between the superior colliculus and the primary visual cortex during development.

My PhD brought more questions than answers and after studying how the superior colliculus is organized during development, I was intrigued by how this structure guides our actions and helps us cope with an ever-changing environment. With this in mind, I decided to join Jianhua Cang's (JC) lab at Northwestern for a post-doc. One of my goals was to understand how the superior colliculus, which is an evolutionary ancient structure, communicates with the more recently evolved cortex and how our intents can suppress responses triggered by the environment. Seven years later, I still have not fully answered these questions, but I’ve discovered a few things along the way. For example, how our own motion affects visual responses in the superior colliculus and how neurons with specialized visual responses are organized relatively to each other. I also identified a molecular marker for direction selectivity.

Soon after I joined, JC’s lab was relocated to the University of Virginia, which is surrounded by a mountain range nicknamed the “Blue Ridge”! This move introduced me to one of the animal models that I currently use, the tree shrew. Tree shrews are closely related to primates, are active during daylight and move similarly to squirrels, making fast jumps and bolting. When JC first asked me if I was interested in working with these animals, my first answer was “why would you do such a thing?” I’ve changed my mind quite a bit since these similarities make the work more relevant to humans and have been active in the promotion of this animal model to investigate visual processes, as well as answer other neurobiological and biomedical questions.

Then came the time to find a “real” job. I had never questioned if I wanted to stay in academia or not. My career path had always been about getting in the next position that would allow me to answer the next scientific questions and doing what it takes to get there. I applied for the K99 and got scored on the first attempt, but not funded. I tried again, after addressing every comment, and got funded in 2021. This grant put me in a competitive position concerning applying for faculty jobs, but also meant that time was limited. Having a deadline, I was pushed to apply earlier than I had expected, but I haven’t heard anyone say they ever felt ready for this transition! Looking back on this period, it is worth mentioning that everything takes longer than expected and the time you’ll devote to applying for jobs will put a serious dent on your scientific progress. It’s never too early to get started with this process. Another thing to keep in mind is to avoid “self-inhibition”, that is holding back from applying to places that seem out of reach. If you don’t try, you can’t succeed.

I’ve always been keen on reaching out to other labs and asking for their expertise. I strongly believe that science is a collaborative process and that working in isolation can only hurt the quality of our findings. This viewpoint helped me a great deal with the interviewing process, during which I tried to perceive the whole experience as a conversation with colleagues of mine who I just hadn’t had a chance to meet yet.

When I applied to faculty positions, I had a few criteria in mind that I was not willing to compromise. This helped me narrow down my search, reduce the number of applications to send out and target my cover letters. What I had in mind was an R1 institution with a collaborative mindset, high scientific standards, and of course willing to take me and my shrews! I was lucky to find everything I could have asked for within the MIP Department! I am delighted to have found such a welcoming department that has been extremely supportive. There is still a long way to go before the lab is up and running and a steep learning curve ahead, but I can only be thrilled by the challenges to come! I am delighted to have been given a chance to join the MIP family and look forward to growing the lab, developing collaborations and getting to know all the other members of the Department. Hopefully soon I might be able to answer some of the questions that keep me up at night: What does the superior colliculus do? How do different brain structures interact to generate vision? And more importantly why would someone want to work with tree shrews?

Iwas born in a small village that is about six hours from Shanghai by bus. I did not grow up with the prosperity that a lot of Chinese families can enjoy nowadays. My mom took care of three kids, grew her own crops, vegetables and farmed her own chickens, pigs and sheep, all by herself. There was not much cash, but my mom made sure we were fed and there were resources to maintain the house by trading her own farm produce. I had great times growing up in a small village and exploring nature. I caught beetles high up in trees and tried to burn their armor, to find that they survived very well from my misdemeanors. I also blew air into a little frog’s belly with a grass straw and watched it become a little balloon, pee on my hands and then jump away. I loved summer as I could go down to the streams to harvest little shrimps and fishes trapped in water puddles. I loved it when my mom and sisters enjoyed them as a meal.

My dad was at college in the northern part of China and later served as a military soldier and built basic electric infrastructures for citizens. The family did not regroup until I was 10-years old. My dad landed a job teaching electronics in a small college in the city of Yancheng and that was when I started to receive a