Research neuroscientist Kheirbek joins department faculty

Please join us in welcoming research neuroscientist Mazen A. Kheirbek, PhD, as he officially begins his appointment today as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry. He holds a PhD in neurobiology from the University of Chicago, where he also completed a postdoctoral fellowship. Before coming to UCSF, Kheirbek served on the faculty at Columbia University and on the research staff of the Research Foundation for Mental Hygiene.

Kheirbek’s research focuses on understanding the circuits that underlie emotional behavior by combining optogenetic, cell type-specific functional imaging, and electrophysiological and behavioral techniques. At UCSF, his laboratory will concentrate its efforts on deconstructing circuits that underlie maladaptive behaviors in order to develop better therapies for psychiatric illness and understanding how experiences are encoded within the activity of populations of neurons.