For press inquiries and general information,
For scientific or program inquiries,
James E. Keeley, Jr.
Director of Strategic Communication & News
(301) 215-8858
For scientific or program inquiries,
Nelson Spruston, Ph.D.
Scientific Program Director
(571) 209-4358
Janelia Farm Research Campus
19700 Helix Drive
Ashburn, VA 20147
(571) 209-4000
Laboratories
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RESEARCH FOCUS:
Eva Pastalkova is studying the neuronal mechanisms that generate brain activity internally, while a rat performs a cognitive task. The influence of the external stimuli on the recorded activity is eliminated by making the stimuli stationary or irrelevant. More
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Stefan Pulver uses a combination of neurogenetics, calcium imaging, and electrophysiology to study how central pattern generating circuits drive locomotion in Drosophila larvae.. More -
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Michael Reiser uses experimental and theoretical approaches to unravel the processing of multisensory information in the flight control system of Drosophila. More -
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Lynn Riddiford studies the hormonal control of insect growth, molting and metamorphosis, particularly the roles of juvenile hormone and insulin. She is also interested in the hormonal basis of the evolution of metamorphosis and of metamorphic and reproductive behaviors. More -
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Elena Rivas searches bacterial genomes for undiscovered genes, using a kind of computer method first developed by linguists to try to describe language in formal mathematical terms. More -
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The overall goal of Gerald Rubin's laboratory is to generate, and eventually apply, new tools to study the structure and function of the Drosophila melanogaster nervous system. More -
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Lou Scheffer is extending techniques developed for electrical engineering and the design of chips to the understanding of the construction, development, and operation of the nervous system. More -
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Charles Shank has played a major role in shaping how scientists approach basic questions about how our world works. Under his direction, the Berkeley Lab emerged as a leader in the field of supercomputing and joined with two other national labs to form the Joint Genome Institute, a major contributor to the decoding of the human genome. -
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To understand general principles of brain function and organization, Julie Simpson maps neural circuits in the adult fly brain that govern distinct motor behaviors. Her lab uses a range of genetic, neurobiological, and histological techniques to attack this problem at several levels—from genes and neurons to circuits and behavior. More -
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Rob Singer’s lab seeks to understand the expression and movement of mRNA. His lab developed methods to label RNA endogenously in cell lines and mice. He develops microscopy to observe and quantify single mRNAs in neuronal processes, and can follow the mRNA from transcription through nuclear export, translation and degradation. More -
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Nelson Spruston wants to understand how the properties of individual neurons contribute to the computational performance of neural circuits controlling cognition and behavior. His lab has focused on how the structurally and molecularly elaborate dendritic trees integrate thousands of synaptic inputs to generate action potential firing in the axon, and how the axon itself performs surprisingly sophisticated integrative functions. More -
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David Stern studies how individual genetic changes cause differences in the appearance and behavior of closely related species. More -
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Scott Sternson is reverse engineering the mouse brain in order to understand how neural circuits control innate behaviors. He combines synthetic chemistry with genetics to deliver molecular switches to small groups of neurons in mice. By "flipping" these switches with chemicals or light, he maps neural circuits and measures the contribution of neurons to behaviors such as feeding and aggression. More -
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Karel Svoboda's lab is searching for the substrates of experience-dependent plasticity in the developing and adult neocortex. The functional properties of the brain must change in response to salient sensory experiences, but the nature of these changes at the level of synapses, neurons, and their networks (also known as the engram) is unknown. More -
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Michael Tadross is developing pharmaco-genetic tools to manipulate neural signaling with ever-increasing specificity. More -
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James Truman is developing stem cell-based approaches for analyzing the construction, function, and evolution of behavioral circuits in Drosophila and other insects. More
