My name is Juan Botto and I am a third year PhD student in Prof. Geoff Faulkner’s laboratory, at the Queensland Brain Institute. In our lab we study the Long Interspersed Element 1 (L1) which is the only autonomously active mobile element in humans, meaning that is the only element that encodes all the machinery required for its mobilization from one genomic location to another. In the last two decades, the brain has been identified as a hotspot for somatic L1 expression and mobilization. I am interested in dissecting the relationship between this mobile element and the SOX transcription factor family, which has been extensively described as crucial for neurodevelopment coordination. To do this, I have created new genetic tools that will allow the whole field to investigate how the regulation of L1 takes place in neurons and what are the main drivers coordinating this regulation. I believe that presenting my research at this conference will connect me with people from the neuroscience field. Doing so, I will be able to share the novel tools I created, to expand the understanding of the L1 role in different aspects of neurobiology.