Peyman Golshani, MD, PhD
Principal Investigator
Research Mission
Our mission is to understand how large-scale neuronal population activity patterns in specific cell types drive cognition and to determine how these activity patterns become corrupted in models of neurological and neurodevelopmental disorders.
We have developed or adapted behavioral assays involving attention, working memory, spatial navigation and social motivation. We couple these behaviors with a variety of techniques including miniaturized microscopy, in-vivo two-photon imaging, voltage imaging, whole-cell and extracellular electrophysiology, optogenetics and single-cell RNA sequencing to identify hubs and critical neuronal cell types that can be targeted to improve cognition in models of disease.
Arash Bellafard, PhD
Project Scientist
I use various techniques including optogenetics and calcium imaging to measure and manipulate neurons in cortical and subcortical areas to study neural circuits underlying working memory.
Pingping zhao, phD
Project Scientist
I use miniscopes to understand how the nucleus accumbens, mPFC and their connected brain regions encode and drive social interaction.
Ronen Reshef, PhD
Postdoctoral Scholar
I study the neural dynamics of spatial learning using miniaturized microscopes to record the activity of hundreds of neurons while animals are freely behaving and solving a spatial task.
Liron Sheintuch, PhD
Postdoctoral Scholar
I am interested in understanding how synaptic connectivity within populations of recurrently connected neurons supports learning and memory. To this end, I use ultra fast voltage imaging techniques to record spiking activity and subthreshold potentials from large neuronal populations in behaving mice.
Long Yang, PhD
Project Scientist
I am interested in exploring the neural mechanism underlying spatial memory.
Yan Jin, PhD
Postdoctoral Scholar
I analyze neuron activities within iPSC-differentiated neurons to elucidate the correlation between Autism and neuronal synaptic interactions.
Douglas Vormstein-Schneider
Graduate Student
I study how genetically-defined cell types in the medial prefrontal cortex contribute to population representations of decision-making outcomes.
Diego Espino, MS
Graduate Student
I am interested in the relationship between different rhythms in the brain and emergent behavior. I use voltage imaging to look at how subthreshold population dynamics coordinate network activity.
