This award provides funds for the establishment of a Research Training Group in Neural Processing in Cognition. The faculty group is a mixture of outstanding senior and junior investigators who come from disciplinary backgrounds as diverse as mathematics, neural science and human behavior, but who share a common interest in the use of mathematics and other analytic tools in the study of relation between neural science and cognition. The research programs in which trainees will participate cross the boundaries of neurophysiology, neuroanatomy, psychology, biophysics and mathematics. The funds will provide stipends for graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, will support research participation by undergraduate students, will defray part of the cost of the trainees' research and will enable the trainees to attend scientific meetings. In addition, funds will be used to purchase specialized research equipment to be used by trainees, and to bring visiting faculty from other research and academic institutions for seminars and workshops. The challenge of relating structural and functional information about the nervous system to behavior is, at once, one of the most exciting and challenging problems of modern science. In recent years, the development of a variety of new techniques for locating individual neurons within the brain and other complex structures, for detection and isolation of hormones and other neuropeptides, and for the analysis of the activity of individual neurons has lead to an extraordinary increase in understanding of the physical structure and functional organization of the brain. Similarly, the development of theoretical paradigms and computational tools for analysis of behavior has significantly increased the sophistication of behavioral analysis. The merging of these disparate areas of research in approaching the underlying physiological basis of cognition requires the training of researchers with diverse expertise in fields not often taught together. The program funded by this award will provide both the formal training and the research experience required for creative work at the forefront of modern cognitive science.
