Professor
Ph.D., Harvard University, 1993

Neuroscience and theoretical biology

email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , phone (516) 367-6942, fax (516) 367-8389

Our goal is to obtain conceptual breakthroughs into how brains work. Despite extensive research, we are still far from a comprehensive understanding of how the nervous system gives rise to the behavioral complexities, cognition and affect. We do not yet know what precisely goes wrong in human brains in most major neuropsychiatric disorders, and therapeutic advances remain slow. Nervous systems are complex, with multiple scales or organization ranging from single cells, micro and meso-circuits, to the whole organism and social/environmental interactions. As a result there remain large empirical gaps in our knowledge that can only be filled in experimentally. However, an equally important problem is that of integrating the information thus obtained.

Dr Mitra's work has spanned the different scales of nervous system organization. The laboratory has previously focused on analyzing behavioral and electrophysiological measurements in a number of model organisms. Currently, the laboratory is focused on the Brain Architecture Project which aims at a whole-brain level of analysis of neural circuitry. The Mouse Brain Architecture Project is systematically mapping the whole brain meso-circuit of the mouse, and simultaneously addressing the computational and theoretical questions that arise. An ongoing theoretical program also addresses the fundamental engineering/design principles of the nervous system.

Please visit the Mitra Lab home page.

Selected Publications

Bamieh, B., Jovanovic, M.R., Mitra, P., and Patterson, S. 2012. Coherence in Large-Scale Networks: Dimension-Dependent Limitations of Local Feedback.  Automatic Control, IEEE Transactions on  57: 2235–2249.

Bohland, J.W., Wu, C., Barbas, H., Bokil, H., Bota, M., Breiter, H.C., Cline, H.T., Doyle, J., Freed, P.J., Greenspan, R.J., Haber, S.N., Hawrylycz, M., Herrera, D.G., Hilgetag, C.C., Huang, Z.J., Jones, A., Jones, E.G., Karten, H.J., Kleinfeld, D., Kötter, R., Lester, H.A., Lin, J.M., Mensh, B.D., Mikula, S., Panksepp, J., Price, J.L., Safdieh, J., Saper, C.B., Schiff, N.D., Schmahmann, J., Stillman, B.W., Svoboda, K., Swanson, L.W., Toga, A.W., Van Essen, D., Watson, J.D., and Mitra, P.P. 2009.  A proposal for a coordinated effort for the determination of brainwide neuroanatomical connectivity in model organisms at a mesoscopic scale.  PLoS Comp. Biol. 5: e1000334

Fehér, O., Wang, H., Saar, S., Mitra, P.P., and Tchernichovski, O. 2009. De novo establishment of wild-type song culture in the zebra finch. Nature 459: 564–568.

Pesaran, B., Pezaris, J.S., Sahani, M., Mitra, P.P., and Andersen, R.A. 2002. Temporal structure in neuronal activity during working memory in macaque parietal cortex. Nat. Neurosci. 5: 805–811.

Andrews, M.R., Mitra, P.P., and deCarvalho, R. 2001. Tripling the capacity of wireless communications using electromagnetic polarization. Nature 409: 316–318.

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