Electrophysiology in Research

Professor Tom O'Dell discusses the importance of electrophysiology to the study of cognition.

Electrophysiology, or physiology, fits in the bigger scheme of trying to understand how genes eventually influence cognition or thought by providing an essential bridge between what the gene and the protein it encodes is, and what the function of that protein is. So it is this functional step, we’re understanding how genes, and the products that they encode, actually influence the behavior of nerve cells in the brain – how they react to signals sent from one cell to another, how they can send information on to other cells – all of that is what physiology aims to understand. How the function of those genes actually determines the function of the nervous system. And, of course, that then is what underlies the function of thought or cognition.

neurophysiology, cognition, behavior, behaviour, gene, protein, neuron

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