Welcome to the Truong Group!
Driven by the motto “seeing is believing”, our Dynamic System Imaging uses optical approaches to record the dynamics of biological processes, with appropriate resolution and range in 4-dimensional space and time, to yield insights into the inner workings of cells, and how they function together in tissues, organs, and beyond, in both health and disease.
We are part of the Translational Imaging Center and the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences, Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, University of Southern California.
We currently pursue the following concerted, mutually supporting research directions:
1. Microscopy Development & Applications: we refine and integrate the imaging modalities of Light Sheet Microscopy and Light Field Microscopy, in conjunction with other standard techniques, to expand the Dynamic System Imaging toolset, to push further the resolution, speed, depth, and overall informational content of biological imaging. We validate the capabilities of our imaging tools, often through multi-disciplinary collaborations, with a diverse set of applications – such as quantifying developmental morphogenesis in live embryos, characterizing the glucose-induced calcium dynamics in ex-vivo pancreatic islets, and observing the whole-brain functional activity of a live animal (see below).
2. Zebrafish Neuroscience: we aim to uncover how complex behaviors – such as sleep, learning, and cognition – emerge from and operate within the seemingly simple nervous system of days-old zebrafish larvae. Despite having a brain smaller than a chia seed, these semi-transparent animals possess a sophisticated behavioral repertoire, and thus provide an ideal platform to study how the neural components – molecules, synapses, neurons, circuits – interact together to produce brain functions. Using our Dynamic System Imaging toolset, we develop custom-built imaging platforms to enable real-time observation of the neural components across the intact, living zebrafish brain as the animal engages in naturalistic behaviors. While focused on understanding fundamental processes, our work leverages the conserved neurobiology between zebrafish and humans to provide valuable translational insights into neurological health and disease.