Funded Awards

Project Summary Many social behaviors, such as defense and aggression, are innate- requiring no prior experience to be expressed and presumably ‘hardwired’ into neural circuits.

Project Summary/Abstract: Overall The overarching goal of this U19 program is to determine how neural computations across brain regions produce two core cognitive processes, working memory and decision-making, and thus to derive fundamental principles of brain function.

Decision making is a fundamental cognitive process, and many decisions are based on gradually accumulated evidence. Thus, it is critical to understand the mechanistic basis underlying this accumulation process.

Project Summary Plasticity is a fundamental aspect of neuronal circuits across all species. It is at the base of learning and memory, sensory adaption, and many disease-related processes such as addiction, chronic pain or regeneration.

Project Summary In vertebrate animals, the vestibular system (primarily known as the “balance system” of the brain) interprets head-movement and orientation signals to provide organisms with a sense of self-motion.

Abstract Microelectrode arrays (MEAs) have great potential for therapeutic use in direct brain-computer interface (BCI) control of robotic prostheses to improve the lives of patients suffering from debilitating conditions related to loss of limbs or limb function.

Project Summary Social interactions are critical to the physical and emotional health of a wide variety of species.

PROJECT SUMMARY In social species, social relationships can exert profound influences on individuals’ behavioral and physiological states.

Project Summary: Whether to laugh at a joke or to engage in a lively debate, we flexibly modify our vocalizations based upon social contexts. Such adaptive behavior requires real-time adjustments of motor outputs in response to rapidly changing sensory inputs.

Electrocortical stimulation (ECS) has been used for functional mapping for many decades to identify brain areas that are “critical” for speech and language (i.e., that impair function when stimulated) prior to epilepsy or tumor surgery.

PROJECT SUMMARY Within every brain region, neurons can be classified into dozens or hundreds of different cell types, each with unique functional roles and unique impacts on disease states.

SUMMARY The "NexGen" 7 Tesla MRI scanner at UC Berkeley is a unique resource that we wish to make available for neuroscience collaborations across the globe.

This Phase II project describes the commercial development of HyperAxon™, highly innovative software for performing automated segmentation, tracing, reconstruction and quantitative analysis of all axonal fibers (with and without signs of acute axonal injury) visible in two- and three-dimensional

Project Summary/Abstract: The field of optogenetics — utilizing light to engage biological systems — is widely used for the dissection of neural circuits, cellular signaling and manipulating neurophysiological systems in awake, behaving animals.

Changes in the strength of GABAergic transmission is heavily influenced by posttranslational modifications and allosteric modulators like benzodiazepines and neurosteroids.

Project Summary/Abstract The BRAIN Initiative is supporting a broad portfolio of neuroscience research aimed at revolutionizing our understanding of the brain.

Electrophysiology is a critical technology in neuroscience as a direct measure of neuronal functions. It has become routine for scientists to record and stimulate neuron populations in different brain regions in awake behaving animals, correlating activity with behavior.

Project Summary Oxytocin is a peptide hormone synthesized and released from the hypothalamus for reproduction, maternal care, and social behavior, as well as various ‘non-social’ aspects of internal state and physiological processes.

Project Summary/Abstract This project will provide a more nuanced and mechanistic model of the role of sleep in memory consolidation, particularly as it pertains to procedural motor skill acquisition in a non-human primate model.

PROJECT SUMMARY Survival in dynamic environments demands that behaviors are flexible and adaptive. An organism must make predictions about which actions lead to rewards, calculate how outcomes differ from those predictions (prediction errors), and adapt a behavioral strategy accordingly.