DAVID J. PERKEL, PHD
Perkel Laboratory

Professor

Departments
Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery
Biology
Physiology and Biophysics (Adjunct)

Research Affiliations
Virginia Merrill Bloedel Hearing Research Center

Specialties
Neural Mechanisms of Learned Vocalization

 Areas of Expertise
Neurophysiology
Neuroanatomy

Graduate Education
PhD--Neuroscience, University of California, San Francisco, CA, 1992

Postgraduate Education
Postdoctoral Fellow, Biology, Caltech, Pasadena, CA, 1992-1995

 Local and National Leadership Positions
Reviewing Editor, Journal of Neuroscience
Member, NIH Study Section, Learning and Memory
Member, Program Committee, Society for Neuroscience

 Primary Research Support
Principal Investigator, 2004-2007: NIH R21 MH068530 “A telencephalic pattern generator for song”.
Principal Investigator, 2003-2008: NIH R01 MH066128 “Synaptic processing in the basal ganglia”.  Total direct costs $775,000.
Principal Investigator, 2002-2006: NSF IBN-0213122 “Synaptic connections in the avian basal ganglia”.  Total direct costs approx. $200,000.

Special Honors, Academic and Non-Academic(s)
Member, Society for Neuroscience, American Physiological Society, International Society for Neuroethology

 Most Significant Recent Articles

• Properties of dopamine release and uptake in the songbird basal ganglia.
• Unitary IPSPs drive precise thalamic spiking in a circuit required for learning.
• Seasonal-like plasticity of spontaneous firing rate in a songbird pre-motor nucleus.
• Electrophysiological properties of neurons in the basal ganglia of the domestic chick: conservation and divergence in the evolution of the avian basal ganglia.
• Noradrenergic modulation of activity in a vocal control nucleus in vitro.
• Physiological properties of zebra finch ventral tegmental area and substantia nigra pars compacta neurons.

 Invited Lectures

• Kennedy Center, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, 2005
• Neuroscience Graduate Program, University of California, San Francisco, CA, 2005
• Department of Biology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, 2006
• Department of Physiology & Neuroscience, New York University, New York, NY, 2006
• Neuroscience Graduate Program, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, 2006
• Department of Otolaryngology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, 2006

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