Our research group, the Grup de Recerca en Neurobiologia del Comportament (GReNeC), was constituted in 2007 and is a recognized team in the study of the neurobiological substrate of psychiatric disorders and neurotoxicity, including drug addiction, affective disorders, psychiatric co-morbidity and schizophrenia. 

Our group belongs to the Experimental and Health Sciences Department of Pompeu Fabra University and is located in the Barcelona Biomedical Research Park (PRBB). Our team is member of the Addictive Disorders Network (Red de Trastornos Adictivos RTA-ISCIII) and has been recently integrated in the Neuroscience Program of IMIM (Hospital del Mar Medical Research Institute) for the translational research activity developed.

Our group belongs to the Experimental and Health Sciences Department of Pompeu Fabra University and is located in the Barcelona Biomedical Research Park.

The main research lines of our group are:

• Neurobiology of addictive behaviour (psychostimulants, alcohol and cannabinoids)
• Neurotoxicity mechanisms
• Neurobiology of psychiatric disorders (affective disorders & schizophrenia)
• Psychiatric co-morbidity
• Acute, chronic and neuropathic pain
• Spontaneous behaviour and phenotype of murine models
• Physiopathology of neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative disorders.

The behavioural models frequently employed are: 

• Addiction: Self administration, drinking in the dark test and  two bottle choice.
• Depression-like responses: Tail Suspension test, forced swimming test and maternal Deprivation
• Anxiety: Dark  light box, elevated plus maze.
• Learning and Memory: Radial arm maze and object recognition test.
• Pain: Partial sciatic nerve ligation, acute and inflammatory pain models.
• Schizophrenia: prepulse inhibition test.

The biochemical techniques frequently used are: 

• Neuroinflammation: microglia and astrocyte staining.
• Protein quantification: immunohistochemistry and western blot.
• Neuroplasticity: Neurogenesis and neurotrophins detection.