Clayton Dicclaytonkson

Principal Investigator

Clay first developed his love for rhythms as a young drummer. His decision to forego a career as a rock star and become a professor has been hailed by the music community and regretted by academics world wide! Clay did his undergraduate training at the University of Western Ontario and received his honours degree with Dr. Cornelius (Case) Vanderwolf in combined Physiology and Psychology in 1989. He moved back to his hometown of Calgary for his PhD which he completed with Dr. Brian Bland in the department of Psychology in 1994. He then performed post-doctoral studies with Dr. Angel Alonso at the Montreal Neurological Institute between 1994 and 1999 (and was also one of the handful of voters who prevented Quebec separation at the time). Following this, he went to Italy to conduct post-doctoral studies under Dr. Marco de Curtis at the National Neurological Institute (Carlo Besta) in Milan. While there, he also cultivated his love for Italian coffee, culture, soccer, and a certain Italian girl. Clay returned to his home province of Alberta in 2001 to take up a position as Associate Professor in the department of Psychology at the University of Alberta. Although he never thought he would live in Edmonton he has learned to love it AND to cheer for the Oilers hockey team, much to the chagrin of his brother. Throughout his career, Clay has been funded by and is grateful to: the Heritage Fund, the Alberta Heritage Fund for Medical Research (AHFMR), the Medical Research Council of Canada (MRC), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), the Killam Foundation, the Savoy foundation, the Human Frontiers Program, and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). Clay is currently an Associate Professor in the Departments of Psychology and Physiology and a member of the Neuroscience and Mental Health Institute (NMHI) at the U of A and is an AHFMR Medical Scholar.

Post-Doctoral Fellow

Claire Scavuzzo, PhD

Post-Doc (Psychology), 2014 – Present

Claire is currently too busy doing awesome research to update her profile.

Graduate Students

Aakanksha Singh

MSc (Psychology), 2018 – Present

Aakanksha is currently too busy doing awesome research to update her profile.

Rachel Ward-Flanagan

PhD (Neuroscience), 2015 – Present

Rachel is currently too busy doing awesome research and drinking frosty beers to update her profile.

Brandon Hauer

PhD (Neuroscience), 2015 – Present

Brandon started in the lab in April of 2015, in a strange limbo in between his undergraduate studies (Honours BSc in Psychology, 2015) and the beginning of his graduate work. He joined the Brain Rhythms Lab with a keen interest to better understand memory, and how memories can be represented in the brain. Beginning with behavioural models of memory, he quickly developed a passion for electrophysiology in an attempt to unravel some of the inner workings of the brain. Brandon is currently investigating slow wave activity in the rodent brain,  with a specific focus on widespread coordination between prefrontal, thalamic, and hippocampal regions. Capitalizing on the latest trends in designer drugs (chemogenetics) and utilizing the latest in teeny tiny Pink Floyd concert technology (optogenetics), he is probing neural circuits involved in sleep-dependent memory consolidation. When he’s not nose deep in papers or swearing at Matlab, you can probably find him doing sweet air guitar solos and listening to heavy metal, hollering about hockey, or on a back country trail grappling with the sudden realization that he is no longer at the top of the food chain. Oh, or at the Sugarbowl complaining that there aren’t enough stouts on the rotating tap list.

 

Graduate Student Co-Supervision

Lane Liddle

MSc (Psychology), 2018 – Present

Lane is an MSc Psychology student (supervised by Dr. Fred Colbourne) with interests in the mechanisms of injury and recovery following brain injury. In particular, Lane’s focus is on intracerebral hemorrhagic stroke, and the biological, psychological, and physiological sequelae that follow hemorrhagic stroke. In collaboration with the Brain Rhythms Lab, Lane is interested in understanding (at the tissue systems level) how electrophysiological activity is impacted by bleeding within brain tissue, and how to restore electrophysiological activity within damaged brain regions to promote recovery.

 

Undergraduate Students/Research Assistants

Eden Redman

BSc (Psychology), 2018 – Present

Eden is currently too busy doing awesome research to update his profile.

Lukas Kuru

BSc Hons (Neuroscience), 2017 – Present

Lukas is currently too busy doing awesome research to update his profile.

Marissa Sobey

BSc (Psychology), 2017 – Present

Marissa is currently too busy doing awesome research to update her profile.

Irina Rakotovao

BSc (Psychology), 2017 – Present

Irina is currently too busy doing awesome research to update her profile.