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| Our laboratory is studying the cognitive neural
processes involved in feeding and sexual behavior with the
aim of understanding the integrated brain mechanisms for sensing
appetite or choosing heterosexual partners. The brain is an
amazing system capable of regulating information from the
internal and external world and responding appropriately to
the environment. However, the problems of food intake such
as obesity and eating disorders, and reproductive dysfunctions
such as infertility are drastically increasing in the modern
society. It may indicate that imbalances are occurring in
the brain functions governing preservation of individuals
and species under the influence of changes in chemical environments.
Our research focuses on the interaction between the brain
and the environment, exploring how the brain is affected by
the manmade chemical substances, such as endocrine sirupters,
as well as by the naturally producing plant-derived chemicals,
such as "green oders". |
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| This
program teaches neuroscientific methods for analyzing
higher brain functions such as emotion, learning and
motivation. For example, students insert electrodes
in the brains of anesthetized rats, expose them to various
stimuli and record neural activity. Through this procedures
they can directly observe total neural activity from
the time of stimulation to the time of activity output.
The brain is an inexhaustible source of as yet untapped
functional applications for manmade devices. Students
will see with their own eyes that although the rat brain
is only as large as their fingertip, it is a high-functioning,
compact collection of complex elements and gain a more
systematic understanding of the brain and behavior.
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