Mark Howe

Biography:

Driven by questions of motivation and movement, Howe’s research is focused on gaining deeper understanding of neural mechanisms and circuitry. By studying functional and dysfunctional neural systems, Howe aims to inform treatment approaches for Parkinson’s disease, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and addiction. Howe developed a novel approach to striatum imaging that contributed to groundbreaking findings in dopamine signaling during behavior. His research showed that separate cell populations of the neurochemical dopamine are engaged differently for movement and reward, rather than the same population mediating both functions. Howe’s research has been published in Nature, Neuron, Journal of Neuroscience, and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Howe—who will join BU in spring 2018—will use novel functional imaging approaches to investigate network and cellular computations performed by circuits of the basal ganglia to control action selection, motivation, and learning in health and disease.

Research Interests:

basal ganglia circuit mechanisms for learning and action