ABOUT THIS KIND OF RESEARCH

How does the nervous system take patterns of light at the eye, sound at the ear, or touch on the skin and determine properties of the surrounding environment? Fundamental problems in this area include how such patterns of energy are transduced by sensory systems, how they lead to the perception of a coherent 3D world and recognition of objects by the brain, and how they support adaptive behavior. To understand this nearly miraculous achievement requires attacking the problem at several levels simultaneously: from molecular mechanisms of information storage and signaling, to the neural networks that code and process sensory information, to the functional processes of perception, recognition, and behavioral control that must be implemented by the brain. A wide range of faculty at Brown are approaching this challenge with a state-of-the-art toolkit, including molecular, neuroanatomical and neurophysiological techniques, fMRI, neuropsychological, psychophysical and behavioral experiments, and statistical, neural-network and formal modeling.

FACULTY INVOLVED
 

• Carlos Aizenman
  Research: Studying the role of experience in the development of neural circuits, by focusing on the development of the tadpole visual system.
  
  Graduate program: Neuroscience
  
  
• Elaine Bearer
  Research: Molecular mechanisms of acting dynamics in growth cones and in axoplasmic transport.
  
  Graduate programs: Molecular Biology, Cell Biology and Biochemistry; Pathobiology; Neuroscience; Physiology
   
• David Berson
  Research: Structure and function of retinal output channels.
  
  Graduate programs: Neuroscience; Molecular Pharmacology & Physiology
   
• Elie Bienenstock
  Research: Compositional mechanisms in natural and artificial vision.
  
  Graduate program: Applied Math; Neuroscience
   
• Michael Black
  Research: Computer Vision. Motion estimation and analysis using probabilistic and statistical methods.
  Graduate programs: Computer Science.
   
• Sheila Blumstein
  Research: Neural basis of language, and processes and mechanisms involved in speaking and understanding; aphasia.
  
  Graduate programs: Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences, Neuroscience
   
• Rebecca Burwell
  Research: Neuroanatomical and electrophysiological approaches to examining the contribution of parahippocampal regions to memory and cognitive functions.
  
  Graduate programs: Neuroscience; Psychology
   
• Russell Church
  Research: Quantitative models of time perception and timed performance.
  
  Graduate program: Psychology
   
• Barry Connors
  Research: Understand the neocortex by studying its individual neurons, synapses, and transmitters and their collective behavior.
  
  Graduate programs: Neuroscience; Molecular Pharmacology and Physiology
   
• Fulvio Domini
  Research: 3D shape perception, motion, depth perception, computational vision.
  
  Graduate program: Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences
   
• Laurie Heller
  Research: Auditory perception and cognition; psychophysics.
  
  Graduate program: Psychology
   
• Rachel Herz
  Research: Olfactory cognition and perception and the role of emotion, context and genetics.
  
  Graduate program: Psychology
   
• Benjamin Kimia
  Research: The computational and perceptual aspects of recovery and representing of shape of objects for such tasks as object recognition and construction of brain atlases.
  
  Graduate program: Engineering
   
• David Laidlaw
  Research: Biological imaging, visualization, modeling and computation.
  
  Graduate program: Computer Science
   
• Phil Lieberman
  Research: Language and thought in an evolutionary context.
  
  Graduate program: Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences
  
  
• Mayank Mehta
  Research: Mechanisms of learning in neuronal networks. We use simultaneous recording of a large number of neurons, and computational modeling.
   
• David Mumford
  Research: The construction of stochastic models for the study of vision and especially the modeling of image statistic and of shape.
  
  Graduate programs: Applied Mathematics; Physics
  
  
• Predrag (Pedja) Neskovic
  Research: Neural networks, pattern recognition and computer vision.
   
• Michael Paradiso
  Research: The neural basis of visual perception.
  
  Graduate program: Neuroscience
  
   
• David Sheinberg
  Research: Neural mechanisms of natural vision.
  
  Graduate program: Neuroscience
   
• Harel Shouval
  Research: Theoretical and experimental aspects of synaptic plasticity.
  
  Graduate program: none
   
• Harvey Silverman
  Research: Speech recognition and microphone arrays.
  
  Graduate program: Engineering
   
• Andrea Simmons
  Research: Development of auditory and vestibular systems in auditory system; animal communication.
  
  Graduate programs: Psychology; Neuroscience
   
• James Simmons
  Research:
  
  Graduate program: Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences
   
• Michael Tarr
  Research: Behavioral, computational and neuroscientific study of object recognition.
  
  Graduate programs: Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences; Neuroscience; Psychology
   
   
• William Warren
  Research: Human perception and action; visual control of locomotion and navigation.
  
  Graduate program: Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences
   
• Leslie Welch
  Research: Human visual psychophysics of motion perception, binocular vision, spatial vision
  
  Graduate programs: Psychology; Neuroscience; Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences
   
• Anita Zimmerman
  Research: Structure and function of ion channels; photoreceptors.
  
  Graduate programs: Molecular Pharmacology & Physiology; Neuroscience