We aim to understand how activity is orchestrated within neural circuits to give rise to behavior. With this in mind, our research focuses on the cerebellum, a brain area that is critical for coordinated motor control and motor learning and whose circuitry is well characterized.

The lab’s major achievements so far include establishing a quantitative framework to identify specific cerebellar contributions to mouse locomotor coordination (Machado, Darmohray et al., eLife 2015; Machado et al., eLife 2020); dissecting circuit mechanisms for modulation of cerebellar learning by behavioral state (Albergaria et al., Nature Neuroscience 2018); and establishing a paradigm for locomotor learning in mice (Darmohray et al., Neuron 2019).

Our ongoing work combines quantitative behavioral analysis and neurophysiology with genetic tools to understand how cerebellar circuits enable complex, coordinated movement.