Research Focus
I study how the brains of birds encode learned behaviors like song or
memory for food locations. Particular questions now being studied include
the neural basis for female song discrimination, and the interplay between
the hippocampus and other brain areas in spatial memory. I study these
questions in a variety of species in order to infer how these abilities evolved.
In the news
- Brains! Collection is a (slightly spooky) artifact of an earlier era
- Biology students teach STEM curriculum in Colombia
- Engaged Cornell grants fund undergrad and faculty research
- 'I’m just overwhelmed by the unknowns in the field of neuroscience'
- In brain evolution, size matters -- most of the time
- Nine projects receive undergrad engaged research funding
Courses - Fall 2025
- HD 4000 : Directed Readings
- HD 4010 : Empirical Research
- HD 4020 : Supervised Fieldwork
- PSYCH 4700 : Undergraduate Research in Psychology
- PSYCH 4710 : Advanced Undergraduate Research in Psychology
- PSYCH 6271 : Topics in Biopsychology