UC Berkeley Professor Michael Yartsev Named Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator

Michael Yartsev, an associate professor of neuroscience and bioengineering at UC Berkeley, is the campus’s newest Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Investigator, the HHMI announced today.

Yartsev is among 26 of the nation’s leading scientists to be named new HHMI Investigators. The honor comes with significant research investment that enables Investigators to “push the boundaries of science,” the HHMI said in a press release.

“HHMI is committed to supporting visionary scientists who are pursuing discoveries that will change our world for the better,” said HHMI Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer Leslie Vosshall.

The HHMI’s investment in each new investigator totals roughly $11 million over a seven-year period, and the amount is renewable pending a successful scientific review of the researcher’s work. This support includes their full salary and benefits, a generous research budget, scientific equipment and additional resources.

Guided by the principle of investing in “people, not projects,” HHMI provides Investigators with the time and resources they need to go where their science leads, Vosshall said.

In his research, Yartsev seeks to understand the brain computations that underlie the natural behaviors that animals and humans have evolved to carry out, including the abilities to navigate, socialize and communicate. To do this, he utilizes an unusual model system in neuroscience — the bat.

Yartsev’s lab has created cutting-edge new technologies that allow them to record the brain activity in freely behaving and flying bats, including both individuals and groups, at unprecedented levels of detail.

“A major goal of neuroscience is to understand how the brain supports what animals and humans naturally do. Yet, because natural behaviors can be highly dynamic, variable and complex, most neuroscience studies are conducted under simplified, often artificial, experimental conditions, which creates a fundamental gap between what we aim to understand and what we actually study. My goal is to bridge this gap.” Yartsev said.

“This high-risk, high-reward endeavor requires a long-term vision and investment,” Yartsev added. “Support from HHMI is crucial because it allows us to adopt a long-term perspective on the fundamental problems we aim to solve and provides the flexibility to pursue innovative research directions that would be difficult to pursue otherwise.”

Yartsev joins more than 250 HHMI investigators around the U.S., 20 of whom are at Berkeley.