John Assad, Ph.D.
Open the John Assad faculty profile graphic in Canva (opens in a new tab)
John Assad, PhD
Professor of Neurobiology
Department of Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School
Director, Harvard Program in Neuroscience
Email:
john_assad@hms.harvard.edu
Website:
Assad Lab website – more information about John Assad’s research (opens in a new tab)
The Aim
The Assad lab studies how the brain decides when to initiate voluntary movement.
The Impact
Our lab studies how the brain decides when to move. While most research has focused on reactions to outside events, we are interested in what triggers self‑initiated actions by investigating how different brain regions and cell types contribute to this process. This has implications for people who struggle to start movements on their own, such as is the case in those with Parkinson’s disease.
A Closer Look
Quanta Magazine – December 2021: Dopamine and the timing of voluntary movement (article, opens in a new tab)
Quanta covered Assad’s discovery that dopamine, known mainly as a reward signal, slowly builds in the seconds before a mouse makes a voluntary movement, with its rate of rise predicting almost exactly when the animal will act. This finding has direct implications for Parkinson’s disease, in which self‑initiated movement is disrupted.
Harvard Griffin GSAS – July 2021: Exploring the mechanisms that underlie the timing of movement (article, opens in a new tab)
A Harvard profile on Assad and a PhD candidate in his lab explores the mechanisms that underlie the timing of movement. Their research revealed that dopamine neurons may function as the brain’s “go” signal for voluntary action.
Nat Neurosci
View full abstract on Pubmed