Current research areas

in the laboratory

Research in the lab takes an integrative, systems-level approach to understanding the neural mechanisms that govern the sensory, perceptual, and cognitive processing of acoustic communication signals and real-world sounds. Our primary focus is on the elaborate vocal communication system of the European starling, a species of songbird.

Neural Mechanisms

of Decision Processes

Female mate-choice in songbirds provides an excellent context to study the specific neural mechanisms of decision processes involving natural stimuli. The lab has developed a novel procedure for assaying female song preference that permits extracellular electrophysiology in awake behaving songbirds. We are exploring a number of behavioral manipulations that target more specific acoustic features of male songs which drive female choice

The lab uses a variety of behavioral techniques to examine the statistical organization of spectral and temporal song at multiple acoustic levels. We want to know how such information constrains and biases acoustic pattern perception, attention, and memory mechanisms. These studies are fueled in part by our recent demonstration that songbirds can learn very complex temporal patterns described by grammars thought to be uniquely human.

Behavioral Mechanisms

of Auditory Perception and Cognition

Representational Coding

of Auditory Objects

We are studying multiple populations of neurons in the songbird brain, in areas analogous to mammalian auditory cortex, whose responses are directly linked to behaviorally relevant variation among conspecific songs. Current studies in the lab investigate the neural mechanisms that give rise to these representations across the auditory forebrain. We are interested in fundamental questions of stimulus coding and receptive field organization, the transformation of information across brain regions, and the role of network level activity in shaping the brain's responses to natural communication signals. Some of this work is carried out in collaboration with physicists at UCSD and the Salk Institute.

People

Current lab members

Tim Gentner

Primary Investigator

Tim Gentner is the PI of the lab. He has been running Gentner Lab since 2006.

Michael Turvey

Grad Student

Michael is a PhD candidate from the Psychology department primarily interested in predictive coding in an auditory context, using trained behavior. Specifically, he is investigating how expectation induced by behavioral training in the European starling affects representation at different levels in the auditory hierarchy.

Srihita Rudraraju

Grad Student

Srihita is a Master's student in Bio Engineering studying neural representations of birdsong.

Trevor Supan McPherson

Grad Student

Trevor is a Neurosciences PhD student interested in how information is relationally coded in songbird neuronal population activity.

Lauren Stanwicks

Grad Student

Lauren is a PhD student in the Neurosciences Graduate Program and is interested in error processing and sensory-motor feedback.

Julia Gorman

Grad Student

Julia is a PhD student in Neurosciences leveraging in silico approaches to investigate neural dynamics in sensorimotor processes.

Katie Christman

Grad Student

Katie is a PhD student in the Psychology department studying the auditory, perceptual, and neural processing of echolocation in bottlenose dolphins.

Colin Trimmer

Grad Student

Colin is a PhD student investigating the neurobiology of magnetoreception in songbirds, one of the least understood sensory systems.

Jeffrey Xing

Grad Student

Jeffrey is a PhD student in the Psychology department studying songbird musicality and aesthetic preferences.

Lauren Ostrowski

Grad Student

Lauren is an MD/PhD student in the Neurosciences Graduate Program studying the neural dynamics underlying vocal communication for brain-computer interface development.

Xavier Perez

Grad Student

Xavier is a Ph.D. student in the Electrical and Computer Engineering department with an emphasis in Medical Devices and Systems, studying birdsong vocalizations, neural signals, and behavior.

Benjamin Lang

Grad Student

Ben is a PhD student in Linguistics with a specialization in Computational Social Science and is interested in phonetics and the neural bases of speech perception in humans.

Former lab members

Pablo Tostado

Grad Student

Daril Brown II

Grad Student

Kai Chen

Grad Student

Anna Mai

Grad Student

Zeke Arneodo

Postdoc

Justin Kiggins

Grad Student

Krista Perks

Grad Student

Leif Gibb

Grad Student

Jason Thompson

Grad Student

James Jeanne

Grad Student

Micah Bregman

Grad Student

Emily Caporello

Grad Student

Dan Knudsen

Grad Student

Rebecca Calisa

Postdoc

Andrei Kozlov

Research Scientist

Jordan Commins

Grad Student

Sean Coffinger

Grad Student

Tim Sainburg

Grad Student

Brad Thielman

Grad Student

Nasim Vahidi

Grad Student

Sasen Cain

Grad Student

Darvesh Gorhe

Undergraduate Student

Publications

See a full list of publications on Google Scholar