Valérie Lapointe


e-mail: valerie.lapointe@uleth.ca
Lab: EP 1213

Biography

Valérie Lapointe grew up in Quebec. She came to Lethbridge in the summer of 1997 with the Provincial Summer Student Exchange. She worked at the Lethbridge Research Center during and after completing her B.Sc. in Biology. She went to Montreal to pursue a M.Sc. in Neuroscience with Dr. Jean-Claude Lacaille. There she studied the plasticity of the interneuron of the hippocampus. She returned to Lethbridge in 2003 and has been working at the University of Lethbridge in Biology and Neuroscience. Valérie worked briefly with Dr. Alice Hontela studying ecotoxicology and Dr. Robert Sutherland studying neurogenesis in the rat hippocampus. From 2005 to 2008 she worked for Dr. Glen Prusky studying the mice and rat visual systems. She then worked for Dr. Albert Cross studying the effect of Manganese (an MRI contrast agent) on rat’s behavior. She is currently working for Dr. Bruce McNaughton and is involved with in situ hybridization of immediate early genes.

Education

  • 2002 – M.Sc. (Neuroscience), Université de Montréal.
  • 1999 – B.Sc. in Biological Sciences, opt. Animal Physiology, Université de Montréal.

Publications

  1. Neumann A., Luczak A., Steenland H., Sprengers M., Bzymek K., Xie J., Lapointe V., Navratilova Z., Kloosterman F., Vonck K., Boon P., McNaughton B.N., Raedt R. (2014) Onset of spontaneous seizures in rat models for medial temporal lobe epilepsy is associated with changes in neural firing behavior in hippocampus but also in parietal association cortex. Abstract, American Epilepsy Society conference, Seattle, USA.
  2. Montes-Rodríguez CJ, Lapointe V, Trivedi V, Lu Q, Demchuk AM, McNaughton BL. (2013) Postnatal development of Homer1a in the rat hippocampus. Hippocampus. Jun 3.
  3. Witharana, W.K., Xie, J.Y., Alme, C., Cardiff, J., Lapointe, V., Demchuk, A., Sutherland, R.J., and McNaughton, B.L. (2013) How the hippocampus allocates cells to places: random draw with replacement? Poster presented at Neuroscience Annual International Meeting: Neuroscience, San Diego, USA.
  4. Witharana, W.K.L., Clark, B.J., Trivedi, V., Lapointe, V., and McNaughton, B.L. (2012) Integrated fluorescence intensity of Homer1a transcription foci indicate integrated neuronal firing rates. Poster presented at Neuroscience Annual International Meeting: Neuroscience, New Orleans, USA.
  5. Dube ST., Lapointe V., Trivedi V., and McNaughton BL (2012). Persistent transcription of immediate-early gene Homer1a in the dentate gyrus and superficial layers of neocortex after MECS. Poster presented at Neuroscience Annual International Meeting: Neuroscience, New Orleans, USA.
  6. Corinne J. Montes-Rodriguez, Valerie Lapointe, Vivek Trivedi and Bruce L. McNaughton (2012). Homer 1a intra nuclear foci change in size and intensity across postnatal development. Poster presented at Neuroscience Annual International Meeting: Neuroscience, New Orleans, USA.
  7. Clark, B.J., Trivedi, V., Lapointe, V., Demchuk, A., McDonald, R.J., and McNaughton, B.L. (2012). Impact of Alzheimer’s Disease Co-Factor Combinations on Object-Place Coding in Hippocampal-Entorhinal Circuitry. Poster presented at Campus Alberta Neuroscience Symposium, Edmonton, Canada.
  8. James Cardiff, Mariam Alaverdashwili, Valerie Lapointe, Ian Q Whishaw and Albert R. Cross. (2008) Does Manganese Effect Single Pellet Reaching in Rats? MEMRI and its effect on Behavior. Presentation for Alberta Biomedical Engineering Conference, Banf, Canada.
  9. Perez, Y., Ratte, S., Sanon, N., Lapointe, V., & Lacaille, J.C. (2006) Cell type-specific changes in spontaneous and minimally evoked excitatory synaptic activity in hippocampal CA1 interneurons of kainate-treated rats. Epilepsy Res. Mar 68(3): 241-54.
  10. Lapointe, V., Morin, F., Ratte, S., Croce, A., Conquet, F., & Lacaille, J.C. (2004) Synapse-specific mGluR1-dependent long-term potentiation in interneurones regulates mouse hippocampal inhibition. J Physiol. Feb 15;555(Pt 1):125-35.
  11. Lapointe, V., Morin, F., & Lacaille, J.C. Mechanisms and synapse specificity of mGluR1-dependent LTP at excitatory synapses of CA1 interneurons in mouse hippocampus. (2002) Poster presented at Neuroscience Annual International Meeting: Neuroscience, Orlando, USA.
  12. Lapointe, V., & Lacaille, J.C. (2002) Specificity synaptique et rôle des mGluRs dans la potentialisation à long-terme des interneurones de l’hippocampe. Presentation and abstract for the AGESFM Conférence, Montreal, Canada.