Broadly, we are interested in development and control of the ‘infrastructure’ of the brain, the network of blood vessels that supply neurons with oxygen and nutrients.  Changes in blood flow are used to infer neural activity, and a better understanding of how neural activity relates to blood flow is crucial for interpreting these signals.  Additionally, since many neurological disorders involve vascular disfunction, it is important to understand the development and maintenance of the blood vessels of the brain.

Currently our research is driven by three main goals:

1) Dissecting the pathways that govern neurovascular coupling in the behaving animal. 

2) Understanding the relationship of spontaneous brain activity to behavior. 

3) Quantifying how hemodynamic forces and neural activity shape the development of the cerebral vasculature.

To address these questions, we use optical, genetic, computational, and electrophysiological approaches in the mouse.