“He who conquers himself is the mightiest of all warriors,”  as stated in Taoism.

 The mission of the C³ Lab is to discover the neural mechanisms and non-invasive biomarkers of core elements of Cognitive Control — the brain’s ability to flexibly adapt to accomplish goals beyond those defined by immediate sensory information. Cognitive Control is fundamental to successful interaction with the world around us and is a strong predictor of life outcomes and mental health.

 Cognitive control operates as a feedback loop: the cognitive machinery exerts control over actions, performance and outcomes are monitored, and this information is used to adjust future behavior. This loop is disrupted in several major mental health conditions, including schizophrenia, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and Parkinson’s Disease.

At the C³ lab, we study adaptive behavior in dynamic and uncertain environments — conditions that closely reflect the real-world, where rules, events, and outcomes are probabilistic and ever-changing. These conditions require reasoning about hidden causes, updating internal models, and adapting behavior across multiple timescales. This diverse range of computations exposes a broad range of interactions between brain areas across different brain networks and how these interactions can break down in disease.

We take an integrative, translational approach that combines research in humans and non-human primates (NHPs). In humans, we focus on behavior and non-invasive physiological signals (e.g., EEG) in visuomotor cognitive tasks. These tasks further guide mechanistic computational models and inform NHP experiments. NHPs offer the unique opportunity to investigate brain function at high spatial resolution – down to single neurons – enabling us to characterize the neural building blocks of function. Our lab specifically uses multi-areal, layer-resolved recordings and causal perturbations (e.g., electrical micro-stimulation, pharmacology), in the medial frontal and prefrontal cortical areas. This allows us to move beyond the popular simplistic “brain area X does function Y” approach and describe cortical function at the level of laminar microcircuitry – which represents the smallest unit of computation of the system.

 Once we understand the relationship between behavioral and physiological measures and the specific computations and their underlying circuitry, we can use them as better tools for evaluating cognitive function and develop targeted interventions that address specific cognitive dysfunctions in disease state.

 The questions C³ lab addresses are:

1. What are the circuit-level mechanisms that support adaptive behavior in dynamic environments? To answer this, we conduct Multi-Areal Laminar neural recordings to characterize the building blocks of function: specific computations and the underlying between- and within-area microcircuitry.

2. What components of behavior and physiological markers are conserved across species? To answer this, we rigorously index physiological markers (EEG, eye-tracking), behavior, and latent computational parameters, in the same tasks performed by both humans and NHPs.

3. How are these behavioral and physiological markers linked to distinct segments of the neural circuitry? To answer this, in the NHP model we record physiological signals (eye-tracking, EEG, etc) simultaneously with intracranial neural activity.

4. Which behavioral and physiological markers best differentiate healthy individuals from those with neurological/psychiatric conditions? To answer this, we conduct comparative studies between healthy and clinical populations in collaboration with clinical partners.

By answering these questions, the C³ lab strives toward a future where straightforward behavioral and physiological measurements can yield meaningful insights into cognitive state and brain health. While we do basic research, we are deeply motivated by questions of translational value; so we seek collaborators who share our vision and can help bring our research from lab to life.