Expertise:
Behavioral
and systems neuroscience, electrophysiology, multi-electrode
recording, computational modeling
Using multi-electrode technology, I am simultaneously recording
the activity of hundreds of single neurons in various motor
cortical areas including the primary motor, dorsal premotor,
and ventral premotor cortices to attempt to answer four fundamental
questions: 1) what motor features are encoded in motor cortical
ensembles, 2) how they are encoded in motor cortical ensembles,
3) whether these feature codes exhibit plasticity as a consequence
of motor learning, and 4) what is the nature of the transformations
that occur between different motor cortical areas. Current
results suggest that specific spatio-temporal patterns of
activity across multiple neurons encode aspects of movement
that are not revealed from single electrode recording.
Besides investigating basic scientific questions regarding
cortical functioning, this research also has a more applied
goal to develop a brain-machine interface by which a monkey
or human can control an external device in real-time by activating
the appropriate neuronal signals. This research which began
ten years ago has lead to neural prosthesis technologies
to allow people with spinal cord injuries to use brain signals
to control external devices such as cursor on a computer
screen. Together with other scientific colleagues, we founded
a company called Cyberkinetics Neurotechnology Systems which
has recently implanted two tetraplegic patients with the
same array technology that has been used in our animal studies.
We have demonstrated that multiple signals from neurons in
the motor cortex can be recorded in these patients. Moreover,
we have shown that these patients can voluntarily activate
those neurons when imagining moving their paralyzed arms,
and by feeding these signals through various decoding algorithms
they can voluntarily guide the movement of a cursor in a
goal-directed fashion.
Specific research projects:
-- Arm trajectory encoding in the motor cortex
-- Coordinate systems employed by the motor cortex
-- Motor cortical activity during sleep states
-- Motor cortical plasticity associated with motor learning
-- Obstacle avoidance in reaching
-- The use of proprioceptive feedback in brain-machine
interface control
-- Hybrid discrete/continuous control for a brain-machine
interface
-- Recoding stability using a chronically implanted multi-electrode
array
-- Spatio-temporal properties of local field potentials
Laboratory personnel:
Wei Wu, Postdoctoral Fellow
weiwu@uchicago.edu
Zach Haga, Research Assistant
zhaga@uchicago.edu
Sunday Francis, Graduate Student
sundayf@uchicago.edu
Dennis Tkach, Graduate Student
tkach@uchicago.edu
Jacob Reimer, Graduate Student
jreimer@uchicago.edu
Adam Dickey, Graduate Student rotating in lab
dickey@uchicago.edu
Maryam Saleh, Incoming Graduate Student
maryam@uchicago.edu
Doug Rubino, Research Assistant (recent undergraduate)
kain@uchicago.edu
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