Carlos Lois

Director, T&C Chen Center for Neuroscience Education

Carlos did his PhD in the laboratory of Arturo Alvarez-Buylla at the Rockefeller University where he investigated the origins and dynamics of newly-generated neurons during adult neurogenesis in mammals. He did postdoctoral work in the laboratory of David Baltimore at Caltech and MIT, where he developed a transgenic method to genetically engineered species of neurobiological interest.

Carlos Lois's group investigates the mechanisms by which the coordinated activity of neurons connected to each other in circuits gives rise to brain function. To address this issue they focus on three complementary questions: (i) what is the wiring diagram of the connections that link neurons together in a circuit?, (ii) how does information flow through a neuronal circuit?, and (iii) what are the mechanisms by which the function of brain circuits remains reliable despite noise?. To investigate these questions they are developing new genetic technologies to identify neuronal connectivity, to manipulate the biophysical properties of neurons, and to record their dynamics. In addition, they use electrophysiological methods to study neuronal activity in single cells, and optical imaging methods to record the activity of large numbers of neurons in behaving animals.