There are three main lines of research in the lab.

1. Sleep

We are currently using flies and mice to ask questions such as What is the biological basis for sleep need? How is sensory information prevented from arousing the brain during sleep (i.e. how is sleep depth regulated)?

2. Circadian clock

The clock was discovered in the fly, and its logic is similar across animals. Many basic questions about the clock are still unanswered. We are asking, for example, How does the clock use environmental temperature to estimate time? How is circadian time kept in neural circuits?

3. MOTIVATION

We are asking how animals decide to do something. For this, we are collaborating with the Crickmore lab. We found that male flies calibrate their sex drive to their reproductive potency, and are studying neuronal computations that allow this flexibility.