Anthony Zador, M.D., Ph.D., Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory

Please visit the Zador Lab home page

Click to Enlarge Graphic
(Top) Intracelluar recording of tone-evoked responses from a single neuron in the auditory cortex of an awake rat.
(Bottom) Behavioral setup for studying selective auditory attention in the rat. The rat has been trained to go left or right depending on auditory cues. Not shown is the tetrode apparatus for recording single neuron responses during behavior.

Anthony Zador
Professor
M.D., Ph.D., Yale University, 1994
Cortical mechanisms of auditory attention; autism

email zador@cshl.edu, phone (516) 367-6950, fax (516) 367-8866

We use a variety of physiological, molecular and computational approaches to study how the auditory cortex processes sound, and how it allows us to focus on one sound whilst ignoring the rest (a.k.a. the cocktail party problem). The long-term goal of my laboratory is to
elucidate the cortical mechanisms underlying attention in the rodent
auditory cortex. Solving this problem may ultimately provide insight
into the "Big C" (consciousness).

Research in the lab is organized around three main questions.

•	What are the neural representations of sound in the auditory cortex, and how are these representations modulated by non-sensory input, such as attention and reward?
•	What are the cellular and synaptic mechanisms underlying these sensory representations and their non-sensory modulation?
•	How do these representations change in pathological conditions such as autism?

We use a variety of techniques and preparations, including whole cell and cell-attached recording in the awake (head-fixed) rodent; tetrode recording for recording neural populations in the freely moving, behaving rat; molecular approaches to monitor and perturb neural activity; and computational approaches to analyze neural coding.

Please visit the Zador Lab home page.

Selected Publications

DeWeese, M., Hromadka, T., and Zador, A. 2005. Reliability and representational bandwidth in the auditory cortex. Neuron 48: 479–488.

Wehr, M., and Zador, A. 2005. Synaptic mechanisms of forward suppresion in rat auditory cortex. Neuron 47: 437–445.

Rumpel, S., LeDoux, J., Zador, A., and Malinow, R. 2005. "Postsynaptic receptor trafficking underlying amygdala associative learning." Science 308: 83–88.

Wehr, M., and Zador, A. 2003. "Balanced inhibition underlies tuning and sharpens spike timing in auditory cortex." Nature 426: 442–446.

deCharms, R. C., and Zador, A. 2000. "Neural representation and the
cortical code." Annu. Rev. Neurosci. 23: 613–647.