Stephen Cowen, Ph.D.

Stephen Cowen, Ph.D.

*** The Cowen Laboratory is seeking graduate students!
Please contact me and apply to the Psychology Cognition and Neural Systems (CNS) program.***

Stephen Cowen headshot_secondary


The University of Arizona 
Life Sciences North, Rm 347
1501 N. Campbell Ave., Tucson, AZ 85724-5115
(520) 626-2615
scowen@arizona.edu
 

Lab Members >>>

A fundamental and unresolved question in neuroscience is how the billions of interconnected neurons in our brains coordinated their activity with one another to support learning, decision making, and sleep. Resolving this question is important as disrupted coordination between neurons contributes to conditions such as epilepsy, Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer's disease, and schizophrenia. My research seeks to understand the mechanisms by which the activities of ensembles of neurons and dopamine release are organized during learning, motor control, and sleep. To illustrate, data from our lab indicates that normal aging is associated with reduced reliability and precision of by which neurons fire during sleep and that these changes may impact sleep-associated memory consolidation. Our research also investigates how drugs such as ketamine impact neuronal coordination throughout the brain and how ketamine in particular may correct pathological patterns of coordination associated with Parkinson's disease and levodopa-induced dyskinesia. Finally, our group works to develop new technologies for measuring brain activity and the release of neuromodulators such as dopamine in behaving animals.

Research Interests

  • Determining the neural origins of age-associated memory loss and the role of sleep in the memory formation process.
  • Identifying neural mechanisms underlying Parkinson’s disease and its treatment.
  • Understanding how interacting groups of neurons represent the value of anticipated outcomes, planned actions, and physical space.
  • Developing new technologies to 1) advance the measurement of neuromodulator release (e.g., dopamine) and the activities of large groups of neurons, and 2) for the non-invasive imaging of electrical activity deep within the brain (with Dr. Russel Witte, UA).

Methods used in the laboratory include Neuropixels extracellular recording, optogenetics, fast-scan voltammetry, and novel behavioral tasks. Our investigations target the hippocampus, striatum, motor cortex, and prefrontal cortex.

In the News

2025

6/27/2019 - Our very own Allison Eby was just interviewed for "Thesis Thursday".
https://ubrp.arizona.edu/allison-eby-on-kxcis-thesis-thursday-5-30-19/ 

8/30/2018 - Erin Mamaril was interviewed on KXCI about the work she does in the lab with Dan Hill, and it is fantastic. Congratulation Erin! You are a master communicator.
https://ubrp.arizona.edu/erin-mamaril-on-kxcis-thesis-thursday-8-30-18/

7/12/2018 - Four Questions: Chronic Pain and How It Affects the Brain

5/17/2018
A UA interview on our chronic pain just went live: Four Questions: Chronic Pain and How It Affects the Brain
https://uanews.arizona.edu/story/four-questions-chronic-pain-and-how-it-affects-brain?utm_source=uanow&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=

1/31/2017
JP and I have a little piece in the AZ Star... (you need to dig through a number of  articles to find it...)
http://arizonadailystar.az.newsmemory.com/?special=College+of+Science

1/28/2017 - Just accepted....
Parent K, Hill D, Crown L, Wiegand J, Gies K, Miller MMM, Atcherley CA, Heien ML, Cowen SL, (2017) A platform to enable combined measurement of dopamine and neural activity (DANA), Analytical Chemistry, in press.

9/18/2016 - Our collaborative work with Dr. Russ Witte to develop a new ultrasound imaging device:

4/7/2016 - Our ripple and aging paper was just accepted at the Journal of Neuorscience! 
Wiegand JL, Gray DT, Schimanski LA, Lipa P, Barnes CA, Cowen SL (2016) Age is associated with reduced sharp-wave ripple frequency and altered patterns of neuronal variability, In press: J Neurosci.

1/27/2016 - A Science Cafe talk at Magpies Pizza: Riding the (Brain) Waves: How Brains and Drugs Produce Hallucinations http://cos.arizona.edu/connections/for-the-public/ua-science-cafes

1/20/2016 - Our work was just showcased through an interview with Dr. Leslie Tolbert on NPR 89.1: Arizona Spotlight Episode 11: How our brain makes up its mind. https://radio.azpm.org/arizonascience/

12/16/2015 - Our collaboration with Dr. Russ Witte was just highlighted on UA Now! http://news.engr.arizona.edu/news/ua-researchers-developing-brain-mapping-technology

10/16/2015 - A video of me and Dr. Michael Heien about our NSF Brain Initiative grant to develop new technologies for the simultaneous recording of both dopamine release and ensemble activity in the brain. http://www.nsf.gov/discoveries/disc_videos.jsp?cntn_id=135837&media_id=79376&org=NSF

9/22/2015 - Cowen, S.L., Heien, M.A. Video interview for UA Now regarding collaborative research and technology development: http://uanews.org/videos/lab-two-heads-are-better-one

12/1/2013 - Cowen, S.L. “Is memory in your brain, body or both?” Arizona Daily Star, Sunday Dec. 1, 2013.

Glow Track

A photo with some glowing artistic effects that illustrates one of the decision-making mazes that we use in the lab to assess reward and effort-guided decision making.

Effort Rate Map

This heatmap represents the firing activity (the rate of action potentials) of a single neuron in the rat prefrontal cortex. The neuron was recorded as the animal ran around a maze (illustrated in the picture above). The neuron was most active during the approach the the choice-zone of the maze.

Neuropixels

Neural ensemble recordings from Neuropixels electrodes implanted in the ventral hippocampus (vHC+) and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC). Left: Tic marks indicate action potentials for individual neurons (rows). Right: Correlations (Pearson's r) between neurons.

Updated: 09/05/25