The research in the Kavli Institute for Neuroscience at Yale University, endowed through a commitment from the Kavli Foundation, will focus on the cerebral cortex, the crowning achievement of brain evolution and the substrate of human cognitive abilities. A multidisciplinary research strategy, ranging from molecular genetics to behavior, will be used to explore the development, cellular organization and function of this complex structure that mediates our perception, memory, language and thought. The goal of the Yale Kavli Institute for Neuroscience is to understand how arrangement of the nerve cells and their synaptic circuits in the cortex embody knowledge (the representation) of the outside world. We will study how molecular, cellular, and dynamical changes in these circuits imprint learning of something new and remember what we already know. We will also explore how our genome constructs the microarchitecture of the cerebral cortex that is able to carry out high cognitive functions such as language and thought.

Kavli Foundation Video: Introduction to Neuroscience This link will pop up a window to play a flash video, if you're using a pop-up blocker you'll have to allow pop-ups from info.med.yale.edu. You may also be required to install the Shockwave Flash plug-in if you don't already have it.