William Moody plans to test the hypothesis that disruptions in neonatal sleep-wake cycles, which are known to occur in autism spectrum disorder, cause abnormalities in early electrical activity which, in turn, result in neurodevelopmental changes associated with this condition.

How neural information processing is affected in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) remains unclear. In the current project, Dan Feldman’s lab aims to identify how neural activity in the cerebral cortex differs across diverse genetic mouse models of ASD. Understanding these neural activity phenotypes will help identify the root cause of sensory and cognitive phenotypes in ASD.