Dr. Astorga received her PhD in neuroscience from the University of Chile, where she studied a novel role of TRP channels in synaptic transmission in the fly visual system. Her research interest was later focused on the function of neuronal circuits in behaving animals. During her first postdoc in Paris Descartes, she developed an in vivo preparation to perform two-photon calcium imaging of cerebellar cortex interneurons in behaving mice. She found a GABA loop that ensures interneuron activation and also a novel role for these neurons during orofacial motor behaviors. Currently, in the laboratory of Dr. Charles Gilbert at Rockefeller University, she is studying a new model of visual processing, where top-down cortical signaling can shape the activity of lower order visual areas with the cognitive influences of attention, expectation, and perceptual discrimination.
