Directed by Salah El Mestikawy, PhD, the laboratory’s focus is on the neurons that use glutamate, an excitatory neurotransmitter that is key to the functioning of the central nervous system. Since 2000, Salal El Mestikawy and his team have contributed to the discovery of three glutamate transporters and have implemented a number of tools (probes, antiserums, mutant mice) and methods (anatomical, biochemical, and behavioural) to provide for new ways of studying the role of glutamatergic systems in healthy and diseased brains. Their research work should help not only to increase our basic knowledge of the central nervous system but also to develop new diagnostic and pharmacological tools that target glutamatergic neurons.