Filippo Del Bene, new member of ZeClinics’ Scientific Advisory Board

Having the advice of a world reference in genetic manipulaion in zebrafish is a great opportunity for ZeClinics

BARCELONA, Spain. October 27, 2021

We are more than happy to welcome Filippo Del Bene as the newest member of the ZeClinics' Scientific Advisory Board.

Filippo was born in Italy and studied Industrial Biotechnology at the university of Bologna. Following an early interest in neurodevelopmental biology, he moved to the laboratory of Prof. Jochen Wittbrodt at the EMBL for his Ph.D. Here, he studied the development of the vertebrate eye and in particular the role of the transcription factor Six3, using the small freshwater fish Medaka as model organism. He continued his work on the development and function of the visual system as postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Prof. Herwig Baier at the University of California San Francisco. He investigated the differentiation of eye structures and in particular the neuroretina in zebrafish and started to be interested in neural circuit analysis in this system. In his work, he characterized a new population of neurons in the vertebrate optic tectum that acts as size filter selectors applying optogenetics and calcium imaging approaches. Since 2010, he directed his independent team at the Institute Curie in Paris, where he continues to study the visual system in zebrafish, combining molecular biology, genetics and functional imaging

From 2019, Filippo del Bene is one of the Principal Researchers at the Institut de la Vision in Paris. His major goal is to achieve complete understanding of visual neuronal circuit development and function in an intact behaving animal. To address this question, his group uses zebrafish embryos and larvae as a model to understand the molecular control underlying the development of connections between the retina and the visual processing areas of the brain. He focuses the analysis on the retinal ganglion cells, the cells connecting the retina to the brain, and on the main retinorecipient area of the zebrafish brain, the optic tectum. In parallel, he is also analyzing how these neural networks function together to produce behavior in response to visual stimuli, and how these circuits process and integrate binocular information.

Filippo has received several awards for academic excellence, including an HFSP fellowships (2005), an Atip/AVENIR starting grant from the French CNRS/INSERM (2010), a Starting Grant from the European Research Council (ERC) in 2012 and the EMBO Young Investigator award in 2014.

During his career, Filippo has dedicated much effort to generate new tools in zebrafish by adapting and implementing cutting edge technologies as they emerged, including optogenetics and CRISPR/Cas9 techniques. His contribution has been crucial for the community to be at the forefront of scientific discovery, and made him a reference in the field of gene editing. One of his last generated genetic tools in zebrafish has been the C-T base editing method for point mutations.

We are sure Filippo’s expertise in gene editing can relevantly contribute to ZeClinics’ know-how, and it will help us to develop new and more specific genetic solutions for our customers. 

It is a pleasure to have you on board Filippo. 

Welcome and thank you!