Publications by Giulia Santoni

Chromatin plasticity predetermines neuronal eligibility for memory trace formation

Maria del Carmen Sandi Perez, Johannes Gräff, Marion Leleu, Liliane Glauser, Simone Astori, Giulia Santoni

Memories are encoded by sparse populations of neurons but how such sparsity arises remains largely unknown. We found that a neuron’s eligibility to be recruited into the memory trace depends on its epigenetic state prior to encoding. Principal neurons in t ...

American Association for the Advancement of Science2024

Nutritional metabolism and cerebral bioenergetics in Alzheimer's disease and related dementias

Johannes Gräff, Giulia Santoni

Disturbances in the brain's capacity to meet its energy demand increase the risk of synaptic loss, neurodegeneration, and cognitive decline. Nutritional and metabolic interventions that target metabolic pathways combined with diagnostics to identify defici ...

WILEY2023

Epigenetic plasticity as a signature for memory allocation

Giulia Santoni

Long-lasting memories are stored in a small set of neurons scattered throughout the brain, so-called engram cells. To define a stable engram each region of the brain involved in memory storage recruits between 5 and 20 percent of excitatory neurons. In par ...

EPFL2022

The HDAC inhibitor CI-994 acts as a molecular memory aid by facilitating synaptic and intracellular communication after learning

Johannes Gräff, Giulia Santoni, Allison Marie Burns, Jose Vicente Sanchez Mut

Long-term memory formation relies on synaptic plasticity, neuronal activity-dependent gene transcription, and epigenetic modifications. Multiple studies have shown that HDAC inhibitor (HDACi) treatments can enhance individual aspects of these processes and ...

2022

An Epigenetic Contribution to Neuronal Competition During Memory Allocation

Liliane Glauser, Giulia Santoni, Ana Beatriz Reis dos Santos Marques

SPRINGERNATURE2021

A thalamo-amygdalar circuit underlying the extinction of remote fear memories

Maria del Carmen Sandi Perez, Johannes Gräff, Simone Astori, Giulia Santoni, Allison Marie Burns, Bianca Ambrogina Silva

Silva et al. reveal distinct circuits for the extinction of remote fear memories, with the thalamic nucleus reuniens and its outputs to the basolateral amygdala taking center stage. Fear and trauma generate some of the longest-lived memories. Despite the c ...

2021