Research Areas

The Committee on Neuroscience comprises 72 Regular and 8 Affiliate faculty from 21 departments and academic units at the University of Arizona. Their expertise ranges from molecular to organismal and cognitive levels and their skills from biochemical to anatomical to physiological to behavioral techniques. The faculty are committed to multidisciplinary research and training, and to providing educational opportunities that are stimulating, flexible, rigorous and forward-looking. Faculty energy is devoted to helping students develop the motivation and skills for life-long learning.

The CN collaborate through strong research and training clusters, providing a cohesive atmosphere for graduate study. Several areas of neuroscience are exceptionally strong in the CN, as listed below. A directory and the research interests of the Neuroscience Faculty are listed alphabetically.

Cognition and Neural Systems
Areas of Study:

• Neuroimaging analyses of cognitive functions
• Biological organization and computational operations of neural systems that underlie high-level associative memory in the mammalian brain
• Biological underpinnings of memory disorders associated with anomalies of early development (e.g., Down syndrome), normal aging, and Alzheimer's disease
• Processing of sensory information in visual, auditory, olfactory systems of both vertebrate and invertebrate models
  
  

Developmental Neuroscience
Areas of Study:

• Cellular, molecular, and behavioral studies of the development of sensory systems
• Anatomical, physiological, and molecular aspects of synapse development, with a special focus on neuromuscular synapses in vertebrates and invertebrates
  
  

Insect Neurobiology
Areas of Study:

• Insects as models for studying the organization, function, development, and plasticity of neural systems
• Advancing understanding, and ultimately control, of agriculturally and medically harmful insects
  
  

Motor Control
Areas of Study:

• Vertebrate and invertebrate model systems for analysis of the development and function of motor systems
• Human and non-human models for study of motor control and diseases of motor systems
  
  

Neuropharmacology
Areas of Study:

• Molecular mechanisms of drug selectivity
• Neural basis of pain and pharmacology of neuropathic pain.
  
  

Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences
Areas of Study:

• Language and speech behavior in normal developing, normal aging, and neurologically impaired populations
• Cochlear responses to sound through the study of otoacoustic emissions and non-invasive electrophysiological measures
  
  

Biomathematics
Areas of Study:

• Research in several areas of neuroscience, including modeling of the information-processing capabilities of individual neurons in mammalian hippocampus or insect olfactory lobe and modeling of extracellular ion concentrations and spread of neural activity in olfactory glomeruli