Samuel McKenzie
University of New Mexico, NM·Neuroscience
Memory and attention work together so that we remember the things that matter. Moments of transition, when something unexpected happens and attention shifts, seem to act as boundaries that divide memories into separate episodes.
- Fields
Neuroscience
Psychology
Biology
- Topics
locus coeruleus
hippocampus
norepinephrine
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Feb 2030
What they work on
- Test whether locus coeruleus activity, the brain's main source of norepinephrine, drives remapping (resetting) of hippocampal activity patterns after unexpected sensory changes, using electrophysiology and optogenetics in behaving mice.
- Determine whether network resets in hippocampal region CA1 help mice make spontaneous shifts in behavioral strategy, by recording CA1 activity and manipulating the locus coeruleus during learning.
- Test whether hippocampal output networks directly drive norepinephrine release during network reset, using fluorescent imaging of norepinephrine binding together with optogenetic control of CA1.
More about the research
Researchers think that norepinephrine (NE), an arousal chemical released by a small brainstem region called the locus coeruleus (LC), helps the brain stay flexible by resetting which networks of neurons are active after a prediction turns out to be wrong. Two questions remain open: whether the hippocampus, the brain's memory center, can trigger NE release itself, and how NE shapes the hippocampus's neural code during learning.
Why it matters
Problems with both memory formation and attention appear across many psychiatric and neurological disorders. By working out how the brain's arousal system gates transitions between memory representations, this work could ground conceptual and computational models of how these combined attention and memory deficits arise.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Qi Wang
Columbia University, NY·Neuroscience
Determine whether long-term chemogenetic stimulation of the locus coeruleus, the brain's main norepinephrine source, delays memory decline and improves synaptic plasticity in amyloid and tau mouse models of Alzheimer's disease.
Ahmed Abdelmoneim
Louisiana State University, LA·Neuroscience
Test whether lead-induced disruption of noradrenergic (noradrenaline-based) signaling causes altered stress responses in developing zebrafish, using genetic and pharmacological modulation of this signaling.
Joshua I Gold
University of Pennsylvania, PA·Neuroscience
Develop and test a mathematical theory of adaptive decision bounds that update during deliberation, using behavioral experiments in humans and combined behavioral and neural studies in monkeys making decisions under changing conditions.
The school
University of New Mexico: 27 labs on PI Pages, $355M a year on research, 182 research doctorates a year.
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