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Molecularly Distinct, Meissner-Corpuscle-Associated Mechanoreceptors: A Potential Strategy for Efficient Enhancement of Spatial Acuity
(2017-09-08)
Tactile perception involves a diverse cadre of receptor types that extract distinct but often overlapping features of mechanical forces impinging on the skin. The stimulus features that a receptor responds to can reveal a ...
Investigations Into DNA Double Strand Breaks in Neural Development and Function
(2017-05-12)
Genomic integrity is dependent on the repair of DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) by classical non-homologous end-joining (C-NHEJ). C-NHEJ is essential for suppressing aberrant chromosomal rearrangements, and is also critical ...
Extrinsic and Intrinsic Factors Impacting Local Circuit Inhibition in the Neocortex
(2017-01-25)
Neuronal circuits controlling our perception and behaviors are radically shaped by experiences during early critical periods. For example, early life stress (ELS) has been linked to enduring negative behavioral consequences ...
The Regulatory Effects of Environmental Enrichment on Microglia in Health and in Alzheimer’s Disease Model Systems
(2017-05-15)
Microglial dysfunction is increasingly recognized as a key contributor to the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Environmental enrichment (EE) is well-documented to enhance neuronal form and function, but almost ...
New Insights on Neural Circuit Refinement in the Central Nervous System: Climbing Fiber Synapse Elimination in the Developing Mouse Cerebellum Studied With Serial-Section Scanning Electron Microscopy
(2017-05-12)
For many vertebrate animals, the nervous system undergoes a drastic rewiring between birth and adulthood. This process, known as synapse elimination, is essential to normal development, but little is understood about the ...
A Variant Mode of Mammalian Olfaction
(2017-01-18)
Olfaction – the sense of smell – informs animals about food, mates, threats, and other chemical signals. The odors most relevant to survival and reproduction vary across species and ecology; for this reason, olfactory ...
Modeling Activity-Dependent Synaptic Competition via a Novel Coculture System
(2017-08-24)
Immature neural circuits undergo synaptic refinement, in which activity-dependent competition between synapses results in pruning of inappropriate connections and maintenance of appropriate ones. A longstanding question ...
Prediction as a Rule for Unsupervised Learning in Deep Neural Networks
(2017-08-10)
While machine learning systems have recently achieved impressive, (super)human-level performance in several tasks, they have often relied on unnatural amounts of supervision - e.g. large numbers of labeled images or ...
Neural Mechanisms of a Hyperosmotic Behavioral Response in Caenorhabditis elegans
(2017-04-12)
Maintaining water balance is essential for biological systems to retain normal molecular and cellular functions. Hyperosmotic conditions cause water loss that can be detrimental to organisms’ survival. Behavior plays an ...
A Framework for Understanding Small Nervous Systems
(2017-01-09)
How do we find important neurons and understand how their dynamics control behavior? Both of these are challenging and general problems in neuroscience. In this dissertation supervised by Sharad Ramanathan, I developed a ...