Dr. Hoffman's lab studies the neural computation, neuromodulation, and plasticity underlying perception, learning, and memory. To measure and manipulate cell assembly activity and network dynamics, we use customized high-density multi-site recording arrays, selective stimulation, and wireless recording technology.

Dr. Kari L. Hoffman is an Associate Professor in Psychological Sciences at Vanderbilt University. A graduate of Rice University, she received her PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Arizona in the lab of Drs. Bruce McNaughton and Carol Barnes. Her dissertation work established high-density multi-site recordings of neural populations in the macaque monkey to study changes in neural activity during and after visual learning. In her post-doctoral fellowship with Dr. Nikos Logothetis at the Max Planck Institute in Germany, she used multi-channel neuronal recordings in conjunction with imaging techniques to understand the neural basis of face processing, object recognition, and multisensory integration. Her lab at York University implemented new neuroengineering solutions to uncover the dynamics of neural ensembles during perception, learning and memory in macaques. In collaboration with Dr. Andres Lozano, they compared memory performance and its modification using deep brain stimulation in patients with Alzheimer’s disease. With Dr. Taufik Valiante, her lab measures the neural correlates of memory during perceptual tasks using intracranial recordings in epilepsy patients, to find correlates that generalize or segregate by species.

Lab Website
Email: kari.hoffman@vanderbilt.edu