Our ability to adapt to and learn from experiences underlies many of our cognitive capabilities. We seek to identify the molecular mechanisms through which neural circuits adapt to experience and to understand how the cellular functions that are regulated by these molecular mechanisms generate an animal’s adaptive behavior. We focus in our research on signaling and transcriptional networks and apply genomic, molecular, biochemical, electrophysiological and behavioral approaches to understand how experience-induced signaling and transcriptional networks in subtypes of cortical neurons regulate the connectivity and function of the cortex. We believe that our research will allow us to untangle how nature and nurture cooperate to regulate adaptive behavior and to understand how mutations in the genome might give rise to individual variation in cognitive capabilities and to psychiatric disorders.
How experience regulates brain function
