F.M. Kirby Center for Sensory Neuroscience
Research on the senses is dedicated to understanding how the brain gathers information through the eyes, ears, and other sensory organs, and how it processes that information to create a coherent representation of an organism’s surroundings. Using tools from molecular genetics, biochemistry, computer science, microscopy, and brain imaging, scientists at the F. M. Kirby Center pursue studies of vision, hearing, smell, and taste both in vertebrates and in medically important arthropod pests. Members of the center collaborate to conduct genetic, biomolecular, and cellular studies of the components of sensory systems; to explore the development of sensory systems during embryonic growth and the regeneration of such systems after damage by illness, injury, or aging; and to determine the neural basis of perception that enables the brain to organize sensory information.
