We welcome to the lab a whole group of new undergrads this fall!  Kat Dnovan, Aya Moller, and Mahi Patel are all MCB majors. Mahum Rauf is a biochem major. We are excited to have everyone join the lab!

We welcome to the lab a whole group of new undergrads this summer!  Anand Vellara is a masters student and Brand Kim is majoring in MCB. Rose Olvera and Ethan Hong are both aiming for the Neuroscience major. Imad Mohiuddin joins us from the Psychology department. Burhan Nizamuddin is a major in Brain & Cognitive Sciences. We are excited to have everyone join the lab and look forward to a very productive summer!

It was a busy semester for the Auerbach Lab. On top of another successful Beckman Open House and 4 posters at this year's Undrgraduate Research Symposium, we had several major achievements by our lab members.

Laurel Hart received the C. Ladd Prosser Outstanding Achievement Award from the Molecular & Integrative Physiology for her senior thesis Auditory System Development in a Rat Model of Tuberous Sclerosis Complex Auditory. She is graduated with high distinction.

Sarika Kumar was awarded highest distinction with her thesis Investigating the Role of Cochlear Synaptopathy in Hidden Hearing Loss. 

Walker Gauthier is a 2024 Beckman Institute Graduate Fellow.

Xander Cue project on Exploring Protein Expression in the Auditory Cortex of Fragile X and TSC Rats is being funded this summer by an MCB SURF award.  

Guowei Zhang recieved a Beckman Undergraduate Fellowship this summer to look at anesthesia affects on physiological measures of hearing!

A big congratulations to everyone!

We welcome to the lab, Rachel Qui and Kyndal Smolenski! Rachel and Kyndal are both aiming for the new Neuroscience major. We are excited to have both of them join the lab!

The undergrads of the Auerbach lab recently took time off from their finals to present our interactive exhibit "Rat v. human: the ultimate hearing test" at the Robeson Elementary School PTA STEM Night. While we humans still haven't beat the rats, everyone got an oppertunity to be a 'lab rat' and trying their hearing. This hopefully let them see how we can use reaction time to determine how easy to hear or perceive a sound is.

Welcome to the lab, Harry Kennedy and Harika Matukumalli! Harry is a aiming for a Neuroscience major. Harika is an MCB major. We are excited to have both of them join the lab!

Scientist are people too and we have various hobbies here in the Auerbach Lab. Over the summer, Laurel Hart, created an awesome painting called We Search that got Honorable Mention in the MCB deparment's "Life Inspiring" competition. She was the only undergraduate to win, so a big congratulations to her!

This painting pays homage to the collaboration,  instruction, and controlled chaos of a research laboratory. It takes a  village to keep all of the projects at any given time moving smoothly,  and to watch the pieces gradually come together over time is extremely  rewarding. In my time in Dr.  Benjamin Auerbach’s lab, I’ve had the privilege and pleasure of working  alongside such a bright, inspiring team of people. The mentorship I have  received has been integral to my growth as a researcher, and I’m deeply  grateful to my advisers and colleagues for such a valuable experience. Depicted  are several projects I have contributed to, including fluorescence  microscopy and rat behavior assaying. I investigate neuron growth in  models of autism spectrum disorder, and how aberrant development  contributes to sensory processing deficits. This critical link may have  major applications in sensory oversensitivity treatment and quality of  life improvement for individuals with autism. 

- Laurel Hart's Artist Statement

Welcome to the lab, Gebran Hammoud and Guowei Zhang! Gebran is a sophomore with a Mathmatics major. Guowei is a psychology major with an interest in Behavioral Neuroscience. We are excited to have both of them join the lab this semeter.

Tirth Patel, a junior biochem major, has been awarded a "Get Experience Scholarship" allowing him to get experiance as scientist and researcher in the lab. He joined the Auerbach lab last spring and has been assisting in our behavioral screening. Tirth is considering a career in dentistry and research.

At the Beckman fellowship poster session, Liz Soellner presented her poster "Auditory sensitivity and seizure susceptibility in rat models of Autism Spectrum Disorders". Her summer project as a Beckman Institute Undergraduate Fellow, which she will continue to work on aims to examine  seizure susceptibility in rat models of autism. She hopes this work will help to increase translatability of drug screening methods for ASD treatments.

Dr. Ben Auerbach has a new editorial on Neural markers of sensory processing in development out now in the Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience.

Haichao Wang will be continuing his excellet work with the lab as a technician. In addition, he will also be joining the U of I Bioengineering Master's program this fall.

Peter Sun is joining us from University of California, Santa Barbara. He previously worked in Joel Rothman's lab to assay gravitaxis behavior in C. elegans.