Neural circuits of behaviour

Animals often need to take risky decisions to maximize survival chances. How neural circuits in the brain compute risk and reward is a major question in neuroscience.” KEVIN STARAS
Professor of Neuroscience

To ensure survival, an animal must adaptively select, and then generate, appropriate and often complex behaviours. While human behaviors may appear to be less clearly driven by survival, they are underpinned by common neurobiological mechanisms.

Researchers in Sussex Neuroscience examine the neural basis of behaviour from many different angles. Work on the biological machinery of the brain is carried out at levels ranging from genes through neurons and circuits, while computational work ranges from modelling how the biophysical properties of neurons underlie information processing to the transfer of these principles to robotics and bio-mimetic AI. Behavioural and cognitive approaches to understanding the biological basis of normal and abnormal human behaviours such as reward, addiction and anxiety, are also a major focus in Sussex Neuroscience, with a close relationship between lab work and clinical application.

Faculty