Main Menu (Mobile)- Block

Main Menu - Block

Fitzgerald Lab

janelia7_blocks-janelia7_secondary_menu | block
More in this Lab Landing Page
custom_misc-custom_misc_lab_updates | block
node:field_content_header | entity_field
Our Research
node:field_content_summary | entity_field

The brain’s fine-scale structure is naturally described in the language of physics, biochemistry, and cellular biology, whereas its large-scale structure is more easily framed by concepts from psychology, machine learning, and artificial intelligence. This is a very exciting time for neuroscience because experimenters are increasingly able to measure circuit-level phenomena that are poised to bridge the gap between low-level and high-level descriptions of the brain. Coordinated theoretical progress is needed to transform these data into hypotheses, theories, and principles of brain function.

Our research combines first-principles theory, phenomenological modeling, data analysis, and experimental design to build theoretical frameworks and data-driven models that advance the frontiers of neuroscience. We seek a multiscale understanding of the brain and ask questions that link across scales. We also seek general principles, which should illuminate the details of specific systems and direct broad thinking about the brain. Our integrative goals lead us to work on a wide variety of neuroscience problems, brain systems, and animal models. These efforts are closely coordinated with experimental work from collaborators at Janelia and beyond.

node:field_pullquote_text | entity_field

James Fitzgerald is now an Associate Professor at Northwestern University and can be reached at here.

janelia7_blocks-janelia7_block_right_hand_rail | block

“Science is built up of facts, as a house is with stones. But a collection of facts is no more a science than a heap of stones is a house.”
– Henri Poincaré