Behavior

Hahn, Joel

Associate Professor (Research) of Biological Sciences

The overall goal / objective of my research is to increase scientific understanding of the fundamental structure/function relations of the nervous system. Using a variety of research methods, I have investigated neural circuits relating to specific functions (for example, neuroendocrine control of reproduction, eating, and agonistic behaviors), as well as high-level global network organization of the brain. My current research is geared mostly to developing and investigating nervous system network models, and to building tools and resources for systems neuroscience, and more recently for comparing neuroanatomical ontologies within and between species, to simplify and enable more accurate interpretation and communication of neuroscience data.

Han, S.Duke

Professor of Psychology and Family Medicine

The Han Research Laboratory is dedicated to improving the health, wellbeing, and independence of adults living into old age. We are interested in investigating the diverse factors and neurobiological mechanisms that impact cognition and decision making across the lifespan using multidisciplinary approaches informed by the fields of neuropsychology, cognitive and systems neuroscience, epidemiology, genetics, and behavioral economics.

Herting, Megan

Associate Professor of Population and Public Health Sciences

Our laboratory uses advanced MRI neuroimaging techniques to investigate how the brain develops during childhood and adolescence. Our research focuses on both internal and external risk factors, like hormones, air pollution, and physical activity on brain outcomes like structure, function, cognition, and mental health.

Hires, Samuel Andrew

Associate Professor of Biological Sciences

The Hires lab is investigating the basis of biological intelligence. Over the past decade we developed numerous imaging tools to record large-scale patterns of neural activity that are used by thousands of neuroscience labs. These have resulted in hundreds of publicly available datasets embedded with rich representations of neural activity. We are now developing analytical tools, using recent AI developments, to ultimately distill undiscovered principles of biological intelligence from these datasets.

Holschneider, Daniel P.

Professor of Psychiatry & the Behavioral Sciences

Our laboratory focuses on brain imaging in awake, behaving rodents. We use classic methods like autoradiography and positron emission tomography, along with histologic approaches and 3D brain reconstruction. We have been amongst the first to adapt analytic methods that are part of the human functional neuroimaging toolbox (statistical parametric mapping, functional connectivity, network analysis) to autoradiographic and histologic whole brain data sets. This enables voxel-based exploration of cerebral function in models of dopaminergic deafferentation, Huntington’s Disease, brain injury, fear, stress, hyperalgesia, gut microflora alterations, and chemogenetic knockdown. Our expertise includes functional brain mapping, animal behavior, physiologic monitoring (EEG, EMG, EKG, cardiac output), and histochemistry.