Pets: A long haired hamster named Pickles

Favorite color: green, although I am partial to deep blue as well

Favorite food: roasted turkey

Favorite place: anywhere in the Rocky Mountains above 12,000ft

My typical day begins in the lab. I study biological clocks and circadian rhythms in mice and have to collect my data within a very small window of time over the entire 24hr day. Sometimes this means my day begins at 3 or 4am and may run until 1 or 2 the next morning. Fortunately, I can use several lighting tricks to convince the mice that it is midnight when it is really early afternoon and most of my days aren't quite that long. After I check that the mice have food and water and are otherwise healthy, I usually begin that day's experiment. My advisor's lab uses many different tools to answer questions about the biological clock, so my days vary quite a bit. I usually spend at least one day a week looking through a microscope, examining individual neurons within a small region of the brain called the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN for short). This area is smaller than the tip of a sharpened pencil and requires high magnification to see. After I have taken pictures of the neurons I am interested in, I spend the rest of the day examining them to collect the data that I want to analyze. Sometimes this involves counting cells, looking to see if a neuron has a specific protein or trying to figure out where within the cell a protein can be found. I spend the evening having dinner with my wife and may get in a little writing, catch up on my journal reading or watching a good movie

How did you get to be a brain whiz?
Growing up in Wyoming with parents who loved camping I became an observer of nature at a very young age. This turned into a fascination with animals, which my parents fostered through a variety of pets including dogs, cats, ducks, hamsters, birds, turtles, lizards, frogs, even the occasional skunk or chipmunk! As I continued through school my interests turned toward science, especially biology. In high school, I took an anatomy class and loved learning how the human body worked. The complexity amazed me and I wanted to know more. I had the opportunity to attend a summer program that included a course called "Introduction to Neurobiology." That same summer an aunt of mine began to show the first signs of Alzheimer's disease. These two coincidental events focused my attention on the brain and I decided to pursue a career in Neuroscience.

Further Research Interests
My research interests vary quite a bit. I am fascinated by behavior. Teasing apart how the interactions of molecules within neurons ultimately produce a complex behavior is a bit like a good mystery. We know what the behavior is, but don't know exactly who the chemical characters are or how they interact with each other to produce that behavior. I am also interested in the senses, specifically how neurons takes information from the world (light, odors or sound waves) and converts it into a message neurons can interpret.

What do you think is the coolest thing about the brain?
To me the coolest thing about the brain is its complexity. The fact that three pounds of tissue can contain everything that makes a person a person, their memories, personality, likes and dislikes, simply amazes me.