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JHU Biomedical Engineering Primary Faculty

Xiaoqin Wang, Ph.D.

Professor of Biomedical Engineering
Professor of Neuroscience
Professor of Otolaryngology
Director, Laboratory of Auditory Neurophysiology

Laboratory of Auditory Neurophysiology
Traylor 410
(410) 614-4547
xwang AT bme.jhu.edu
Website

Education

Sichuan University, B.S. (1984) Electrical Engineering
University of Michigan, M.S.E. (1986) Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Johns Hopkins University, Ph.D. (1991) Biomedical Engineering

Research Interests

Our long-term goal is to understand neural mechanisms responsible for auditory perception and learning in the cerebral cortex, in particular the perception and learning of communication sounds (e.g. human speech and species-specific vocalizations). Perception of communication sounds is one of the most important behaviors of humans and higher order mammals and is crucial for their survival and well-being. Understanding cortical mechanisms responsible for perceiving communication sounds will undoubtedly open windows on our understanding of human language perception. Because of the behavioral importance of the communication sounds, their neural representations in the cerebral cortex provide invaluable insights into not only how the cortex encodes these complex sounds, but also how the cortical codes emerge through development and learning. Our research uses a combination of behavioral, neurophysiological, anatomical and computational techniques. Current work in my laboratory includes following areas: (1) Neural encoding of species-specific vocalizations in the auditory cortex. (2) Cortical mechanisms for processing time-varying signals. (3) Neural mechanisms underlying vocal production and auditory-vocal interaction. (4) Developmental and experience-dependent plasticity in vocal production.

Selected Publications

Wang, X. On cortical coding of vocal communication sounds in primates. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 97:11843-11849 (2000).

Wang, X. and S. C. Kadia. Differential representation of species-specific primate vocalizations in the auditory cortices of armoset and cat. J. Neurophysiology 86: 2616-2620 (2001).

Lu, T., L. Liang and X. Wang. Temporal and rate representations of time-varying signals in the auditory cortex of awake primates. Nat Neurosci. 4(11): 1131-1138 (2001).

Barbour, D. and X. Wang. Contrast tuning in auditory cortex. Science, 299: 1073-1075 (2003).

Eliades, S.J. and X. Wang. Sensory-motor interaction in the primate auditory cortex during self-initiated vocalizations. J. Neurophysiology, 89: 2194-2207 (2003).

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