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| Alex Martin, Ph.D., Senior Investigator |
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Dr. Martin received his B.A. degree from the City College of New York and his Ph.D. from the City University of New York. He did his postdoctoral work at the NINDS on the breakdown of language and memory processes in Alzheimer's disease. In 1985 he joined the faculty of the Uniform Services University of the Health Sciences where he studied cognitive dysfunction associated with HIV infection. In 1990 he moved to the NIMH where he continued his work on cognitive abnormalities in neurologic and neuropsychiatric disorders and began functional brain imaging studies on the neural substrate of cognition. Dr. Martin is an elected fellow of the American Psychological Society and the American Psychological Association. His laboratory uses functional magnetic resonance imaging to study the neural systems mediating different aspects of memory, language, and perception.
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Staff:
- Brenna Argall, B.S., Research Assistant bargall@codon.nih.gov
- Dr. Michael Beauchamp, Ph.D., Senior Research Fellow mbeauchamp@nih.gov
- Ricardo Gil Da Costa, Research Assistant rcosta@helix.nih.gov
- Jessica Gilbert, M.A., Research Assistant jgilbert@codon.nih.gov
- Ms. Jill A Weisberg, M.A., Research Assistant, (301) 435-4943 jill_weisberg@nih.gov
- Thalia Wheatley, Ph.D., Postdoctoral Fellow wheatley@codon.nih.gov
- Cheri L. Wiggs, Ph.D., Adjunct Investigator wiggsc@drg.nih.gov
Research Interests:
Our research program uses functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to study the neural structures associated acquiring, storing, and retrieving memories. The program concentrates on three memory domains.
The first domain focuses on semantic memory, the part of long-term memory composed of general information, such as facts, ideas, and the meaning of objects and words. We are particularly interested in characterizing the neural substrate mediating object and word meaning and its role in object perception. We are also interested in understanding how abstract forms of knowledge, such as knowledge of social interactions, are represented. The second domain focuses on repetition priming, a form of implicit learning not dependent on conscious retrieval of prior events. These studies concentrate on characterizing changes in neural activity associated with perceptual skill learning to provide a model system for studying cortical plasticity. The third domain, episodic memory, is an explicit form of memory that involves conscious recollection of a specific past
experience. These studies concentrate on identifying the brain structures unique to this form information retrieval.
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Selected Recent Publications:
Beauchamp MS, Lee KE, Haxby JV, Martin A (2002) Parallel visual motion processing streams for manipulable objects and human movements, Neuron 34, 149-159.
Contact Information:
Dr. Alex Martin
Cognitive Neuropsychology Section
Laboratory of Brain and Cognition, NIMH
Building 10, Room 4C-104
10 Center Drive, MSC 1366
Bethesda, MD 20892-1366
Telephone: (301) 435-4926 (office),
(301) 402-0921 (fax)
Email: alex@codon.nih.gov
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