This research applies fluid mechanics, numerical simulations, and machine learning to model the brain’s waste-clearance system during sleep. By investigating how fluid moves through brain tissue and how aging or injury affect this process, the work aims to identify strategies for preventing or slowing neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's.

This research investigates the neurological causes of sleep dysfunction in people with myotonic dystrophy, a common multisystem muscular dystrophy. Using mouse models and brain activity monitoring, the study examines how diseased brains lose the ability to compensate for stress, providing new insights into sleep quality, cognition, and disease progression.

This research investigates how differences in butterfly behavior relate to brain evolution and memory. Heliconius butterflies showed superior long-term memory and enlarged mushroom body brain regions compared with related species. The work explores how neurogenesis shapes cognition and may ultimately contribute to understanding memory, brain development, and neurological disorders.

This research investigates how Melatonin regulates sleep using zebrafish models. The work identifies the MT1 receptor as essential for melatonin-induced sleep and suggests melatonin may reduce responsiveness to visual stimuli during sleep, helping explain how the brain increases arousal thresholds and maintains nighttime sleep states.

This research investigates brain circuits that regulate sodium appetite and salt preference. By manipulating sodium-sensitive neurons and immune signaling pathways in mice, the study demonstrates how sodium craving can be altered without changing food composition, opening new possibilities for treating excessive sodium consumption and sodium-related cardiovascular and metabolic disorders.

This research investigates how Amazonian butterflies evolve their visual systems to match the light conditions of different rainforest niches. By comparing eye and brain structures across many species, it reveals that evolution repeatedly finds the same sensory solutions, showing that adaptation can be surprisingly predictable and may drive the formation of new species.