Spencer L. Smith, Ph.D.

Spencer L. Smith received a B.S. in physics and mathematics from the University of Iowa in 1998, and a Ph.D. in neuroscience and neuroengineering from University of California, Los Angeles, in 2004. He completed postdoctoral studies at University of California, Los Angeles, and University College London. Since 2011, he has been an assistant professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he is a member of the Neuroscience Center and the Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities. Smith’s research uses state-of-the-art imaging, electrophysiology and quantitative behavior to examine neuronal activity dynamics that encode stimuli and guide behavior at the circuit, cellular and subcellular levels in vivo. His lab has developed novel imaging instrumentation to measure neuronal activity across multiple brain areas simultaneously with single neuron resolution.

He was awarded a Klingenstein-Simons Fellowship (2013), a Human Frontier Science Program Career Development Award (2012), a Human Frontier Science Program Long-Term Fellowship (2007), an A.P. Giannini Foundation Fellowship (2005), a National Institutes of Health National Research Service Award Fellowship (2004), and the Samuel Eiduson Student Lectureship (2004).

Past Project: Population dynamics across pairs of cortical areas in learning and behavior