Skip to main content

Homepage

Gomez-Ramirez lab experiment

How do we perceive touch?

An experiment on haptic perception in Dr. Gomez-Ramirez's lab

Learn More
Four-area population recording in the Snyder lab

How does the brain compute visual information?

Four-area recording and modeling of overlapping receptive fields from Dr. Snyder’s lab.

Learn More

How do our eyes parse the world?

High-precision eye-tracking in the active perception lab of Drs. Poletti and Rucci.

Learn More

How do groups make decisions?

An experiment on collective decision-making in ants from Dr. Sasaki’s lab.

Learn More

How do we learn to communicate?

Studying language acquisition in Dr. Kurumada’s lab

Learn More
Bristol Mountain 2024 group photo

Who are we?

Department retreat at Bristol Mountain

People in BCS

Majors & Minors

Pursue a degree or take courses in brain and cognitive sciences. We also administer a concentration in neuroscience.

Learn More

Graduate Studies

In our nationally ranked PhD program, graduate students are considered junior colleagues and future peers.

Learn More

Research

Our research spans a large domain and straddles several disciplines in the cognitive, computational, and neural sciences.

Learn More

Featured News

Yue Guzhang profile

Student Spotlight: Yue Guzhang

May 2, 2025

Yue Guzhang is a fourth-year student in the Brain and Cognitive Sciences (BCS) Program at the University of Rochester. She received her undergraduate degree in BCS from the University. Guzhang works with Associate Professor Martina Poletti, PhD, in the Active Perception Lab, studying how attention and fixational eye movements influence our ability to see fine details in the fovea.

Learn More
AI-generated illustration of artificial general intelligence shows a gleaming robot sitting at a desk, looking pensive, and writing with its left hand with a few books stacked on the desk." src="https://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/fea-artificial-general-intelligence-large-language-models-1920x1152.jpg" sizes="(min-width: 1260px) 1260px, 100vw" srcset="https://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/fea-artificial-general-intelligence-large-language-models-1920x1152.jpg 1920w 1152h" /></figure><div class="featuredCaptionWrapper"><div class="featuredCaption">(University of Rochester illustration / Sandra Knispel using ChatGPT by OpenAI)</div></div>

How artificial general intelligence could learn like a human

April 3, 2025

Turns out, training artificial intelligence systems is not unlike raising a child. That’s why some AI researchers have begun mimicking the way children naturally acquire knowledge and learn about the world around them—through exploration, curiosity, gradual learning, and positive reinforcement.

Learn More
Hands sculpting a clay brain to illustrate neural sculpting of brain activity patterns.

Sculpting the brain (without chisel or scalpel)

December 9, 2024

Imagine being able to inscribe a new pattern of activity into a person’s brain that would allow for faster learning, or better treatment of psychiatric and developmental disorders such as depression or autism. Now imagine being able to do that in a way that doesn’t require brain surgery or any physical manipulation. Sounds like science fiction?

Learn More
Woman with a string of lit lights around her head and arms raised during the nighttime to illustrate the concept of bioluminescent optogenetics.

Turning brain cells on using the power of light

October 3, 2024

University of Rochester researchers have demonstrated a noninvasive method using BL-OG, or bioluminescent optogenetics, that harnesses light to activate neurons in the brain. The ability to regulate brain activation could transform invasive procedures such as deep brain stimulation that are used to treat Parkinson’s disease and other neurological conditions.

Learn More
A new study reveals that difficulties in adapting to speech prosody may affect how adolescents with autism understand tone and meaning.

Why teens with autism struggle with speech intonation

September 16, 2024

A new study reveals that difficulties in adapting to changes in speech patterns may affect how adolescents with autism understand tone and meaning.

Learn More

UG Research

Undergraduates are encouraged to become engaged in research projects and gain valuable experience for postgraduate education, medical school, or employment.

Student in research study

Learn More

Collaborations

Research in BCS is greatly enhanced by our strong ties with departments, programs, and research centers across the University, including the Medical Center.

Piazza lab fMRI experiment

Learn More

Bluesky

BCS on Bluesky

Want more information about the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences? Contact us.
The Department of Psychology also offers PhD training in Clinical, Social, and Developmental Psychology.