Research Overview

My lab's primary goal is to understand the neural mechanisms that mediate sensation and action with our hands. A major research area is to study the sensori-motor integration mechanisms that enable tactile object recognition, or haptic perception. Haptics is a high dimensional multisensory behavior that engages a large-scale distributed neural network. My lab utilizes a multi-species (rodents and non-human primates) and multi-technology (high-density electrophysiology, optogenetics, and neural imaging) approach to interrogate and control the cross-cortical neural circuits underlying haptics. Better understanding of the cell circuitry and neural dynamics mediating haptics will help us develop better strategies for providing sensory feedback in upper-limb neuroprosthetic devices.

Research Interests

• haptics
• somatosensation
• selective attention
• cross-modal perception
• neural coding and neural correlations

Selected Publications

• Gomez-Ramirez M, More IA, Hochgeschwender U, Moore CI. Regulation of cortical neurons using bioluminescent molecules: A biological method for driving optogenetic elements in-vivo. Under Review.
• Gomez-Ramirez M, Trzcinski NK, Mihalas S, Niebur E, Hsiao SS (2014). Temporal correlation mechanisms and their role in feature selection: A single-unit study in primate somatosensory cortex. PLoS Biol. 12(11):e1002004. PMID: 25423284.
• Kim SS, Gomez-Ramirez M*, Thakur PH, Hsiao SS (2015). Multimodal Interactions between Proprioceptive and Cutaneous Signals in Primary Somatosensory Cortex. Neuron 86(2):555-566. PMID: 25864632.
• Gomez-Ramirez M, Hysaj K, Niebur E (2016). Neural mechanisms of selective attention in the somatosensory system. J Neurophysiol. 116(3):1218-31. PMID: 27334956.
• Gomez-Ramirez M, Kelly SP, Molholm S, Sehatpour P, Schwartz T, & Foxe JJ (2011). Oscillatory Sensory Selection Mechanisms Mediate Intersensory Attention to Auditory and Visual Inputs: A Human Intracranial Electrophysiological Study. J Neurosci, 31(50):18556-67. PMID: 22171054.