I am a neurobiologist with a particular interest in oligodendrocytes, myelin and neurodegenerative diseases. My postgraduate and postdoc studies were focused on brain connectivity, neurotransmission and neuron-to-glia signalling. After returning to Spain from my post-doc stays at the University of Zürich and UC Irvine in 1988, I founded the Laboratory of Neurobiology at the University of Basque Country. The focus of the laboratory was (and still is) to study the cell biology of neurotransmitter receptors present in glia (astrocytes, oligodendrocytes and microglia) as well as their functional and pathological relevance. At the late 1980´s this was only an emerging concept to which I contributed substantially. Importantly, along with my lab mates, I developed and proved the concept that excessive activation of excitatory receptors can be deleterious to oligodendrocytes, and cause demyelination in in multiple sclerosis and stroke. In turn, in the last ten years we have demonstrated that neurotransmitter receptors in microglia and oligodendrocytes can contribute to energy metabolism, tame neuroinflammation as well as promote myelin repair after demyelination, ideas and concepts that are most relevant to translational neuroscience. In addition, my laboratory found molecular and cellular mechanisms occurring in neurons and glia that contribute to the pathophysiology of Alzheimer´s disease and Parkinson.

My keen interest in glia biology drove me to create from scratch the Achucarro Basque Center for Neuroscience (https://www.achucarro.org/) in 2012 at Bilbao (Spain), an institution that now has 150 people devoted entirely to the study of glia-neuron interactions in the University of Basque Country campus of Leioa. I was Scientific Director of Achucarro for nine years until I handed the lead to its new Head back in 2021. After relieving myself of administrative duties, I am currently focused on the study of myelin unexplored functions. I found that brain myelin may be rapidly used under metabolic stress and restored at rest thereafter and thus, prove that the brain shows a greater flexibility than previously anticipated.