David W. Tank is an American

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate cau ...

and

neuroscientist A neuroscientist (or neurobiologist) is a scientist specializing in neuroscience that deals with the anatomy and function of neurons, Biological neural network, neural circuits, and glia, and their Behavior, behavioral, biological, and psycholo ...

who is the Henry L. Hillman Professor in Molecular Biology at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

Education and academic career

Tank received his bachelor's degree from

Case Western Reserve University Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) is a Private university, private research university in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It was established in 1967 by a merger between Western Reserve University and the Case Institute of Technology. Case ...

in 1976 and his Ph.D. from

Cornell University Cornell University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson W ...

in 1983, both in

physics Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...

. After finishing his Ph.D., Tank became a researcher at

Bell Laboratories Nokia Bell Labs, commonly referred to as ''Bell Labs'', is an American industrial research and development company owned by Finnish technology company Nokia. With headquarters located in Murray Hill, New Jersey, the company operates several lab ...

; from 1991 to his departure in 2001, he served as the director of the Biological Computing Research Department. Tank joined the faculty at Princeton in 2001. He and Jonathan Cohen became the founding co-directors of the Princeton Neuroscience Institute when it opened in 2006. Tank was elected a fellow of the

American Physical Society The American Physical Society (APS) is a not-for-profit membership organization of professionals in physics and related disciplines, comprising nearly fifty divisions, sections, and other units. Its mission is the advancement and diffusion of ...

in 1990, a fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (The Academy) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and other ...

in 2000, and a member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...

in 2001. He received the Grete Lundbeck European Brain Research Prize - often known as the Brain Prize - in 2015, along with

Winfried Denk Winfried Denk (born November 12, 1957, in Munich) is a German physicist. He built the first two-photon microscope while he was a graduate student (and briefly a postdoc) in Watt W. Webb's lab at Cornell University, in 1989. Early life and educ ...

Arthur Konnerth Arthur Konnerth (born 23 September 1953) is a German neurophysiologist and neuroscientist, the Hertie Senior Professor of Neuroscience at the Technical University of Munich. Academic career Konnerth received a degree in medicine from Ludwig Ma ...

, and Karel Svoboda. Also in 2015, Tank was awarded the

University of North Carolina The University of North Carolina is the Public university, public university system for the state of North Carolina. Overseeing the state's 16 public universities and the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics, it is commonly referre ...

's Perl-UNC Neuroscience Prize.

Research

While at Bell Labs, Tank was involved in the development of

functional MRI Functional magnetic resonance imaging or functional MRI (fMRI) measures brain activity by detecting changes associated with blood flow. This technique relies on the fact that cerebral blood flow and neuronal activation are coupled. When an area o ...

imaging technology; with

Seiji Ogawa Seiji Ogawa (小川誠二 ''Ogawa Seiji'', born January 19, 1934) is a Japanese biophysicist and neuroscientist known for discovering the technique that underlies Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI). He is regarded as the father of moder ...

and others, the team published a series of papers first establishing the BOLD signal method of measuring brain activity. Tank's research interests at Princeton have recently focused on the physical mechanisms of neural circuit dynamics, particularly those that underlie

short-term memory Short-term memory (or "primary" or "active memory") is the capacity for holding a small amount of information in an active, readily available state for a short interval. For example, short-term memory holds a phone number that has just been recit ...

of motor activity in

animal model An animal model (short for animal disease model) is a living, non-human, often genetic-engineered animal used during the research and investigation of human disease, for the purpose of better understanding the disease process without the risk of ha ...

s. The group also develops laboratory methods and technologies in

microscopy Microscopy is the technical field of using microscopes to view subjects too small to be seen with the naked eye (objects that are not within the resolution range of the normal eye). There are three well-known branches of microscopy: optical mic ...

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Tank, David W. American neuroscientists American molecular biologists Case Western Reserve University alumni Cornell University alumni Princeton University faculty Fellows of the American Physical Society Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Living people Year of birth missing (living people)