Early-life or “toxic” stress can significantly affect neural development and behavior. Picower Institute research includes the effects of genetic and environmental adversity in early development and many scientists also closely study the more general question of how experience changes the brain.

Parkinson’s disease is associated with a loss of dopamine-producing neurons, resulting in tremor and other difficulties in motor control. Research at the Picower Institute includes studies to understand how cells become susceptible in the disease as the brain ages and on improving therapeutic approaches.

Our desires and fears often govern our actions. Those motivations and behaviors are, in turn, encoded in the brain via circuits that connect different regions. Picower researchers study them in detail to understand how they function and how abnormalities may result in diseases such as addiction.

Whether awake, asleep or under anesthesia, the brain operates in various states of consciousness, often for prolonged periods. Picower researchers study the biochemistry and systems that generate and govern consciousness and arousal both to achieve basic understanding and to improve clinical care.