Professor and Chair
School of Medicine and Public Health | Department of Neuroscience
Hometown: Chicago, IL
Betsy Quinlan is Professor and Chair of the Department of Neuroscience at the School of Medicine and Public Health at UW-Madison. The work in her lab focuses on understanding how the brain changes with age, in order to identify interventions that may rejuvenate the aging brain. Her work has implications for the recovery from amblyopia (lazy eye) and stroke, as well as optimizing the maintenance of cognitive function with age.
Talks:
New strategies to reverse amblyopia in adults
Decades of clinical practice has established that amblyopia, or “lazy eye” is difficult to treat in adults. However, this talk will present new research and ideas suggest that suggests manipulations of vision (dark exposure or retinal inactivation) and specific types of visual training (dichopic exercises) may facilitate the recovery of vision in adult amblyopes.
Rejuvenating the Aging Brain
Our brains excel at detecting novelty, and this skill is important for learning, perception and decision making. This talk will present new research and ideas on how maintaining an enriched environment improves can improve quality of life and cognitive function with age.
The impact of time of day and day length on learning and memory
Do you feel like you get foggy at the end of the day, or more easily flummoxed in the middle of winter? It is not your imagination, time of day and day length significantly impact cognitive functions. This talk will present new research and ideas on the circadian control of learning and memory, and the potential to leverage circadian rhythm to optimize cognitive function.