MASASHI KAWASAKI
Professor of Biology
 
Email:    mk3u@virginia.edu
Office:    (434) 982-5763
Lab:       (434) 243-5494
Office:    277 Gilmer Hall
              Laboratory Website
 
EDUCATION
B.S., Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan, 1979
Ph.D., Sophia University, Tokyo, Japan, 1984
   
         
  RESEARCH INTERESTS  
 

My research subjects are the weakly electric fishes - unusual electronic animal species that the nature has ever created. Specifically, we focus on the brain mechanisms for electric behaviors of South American and African electric fishes. My research strategy is to combine behavioral experiments for identification of computational algorithms, and neurobiological techniques for identification of underlying neuronal mechanisms. The ultimate goal of my research is to uncover fundamental design principles of the brain using these attractive creatures.

For more information on research interests, visit my lab website.
         
  REPRESENTATIVE PUBLICATIONS   
         
 

Pluta, S. R. and Kawasaki, M. (2008). Multisensory enhancement of electromotor responses to a single moving object. Journal of Experimental Biology 211, 2919-30.

         
 

Carlson, B. A. and Kawasaki, M. (2008). From stimulus estimation to combination sensitivity: encoding and processing of amplitude and timing information in parallel, convergent sensory pathways. Journal of Computational Neuroscience 25, 1-24.

         
 

Carlson, B. A. and Kawasaki, M. (2007). Behavioral responses to jamming and 'phantom' jamming stimuli in the weakly electric fish Eigenmannia. J Comp Physiol A Neuroethol Sens Neural Behav Physiol 193, 927-41.

         
 

Kawasaki, M. (2005). Physiology of Tuberous Electrosensory System. In Electroreception, eds. T. H. Bullock C. D. Hopkins A. N. Popper and R. R. Fay), pp. 154-194: Springer.

         

 

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