Brian Sciences

Curriculum Vitae

Brian Richard Lustig, PhD

Systems neuroscientist: large-scale silicon-probe electrophysiology, optogenetics, and optical imaging in rodents and non-human primates, plus the computation to turn recordings into findings.

Nashville, TN · brian.r.lustig@gmail.com · Google Scholar · Download PDF

Positions

2023–present
Postdoctoral Associate, Howard Hughes Medical Institute / Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (remote from Nashville). Lab of Albert Lee.
2018–2023
Postdoctoral Associate, Janelia Research Campus. Labs of Albert Lee and Sandro Romani.
2009–2012
Research Assistant, Vanderbilt University. Lab of Anna Roe.

Education

2012–2018
PhD, University of Chicago, Interdisciplinary Scientist Training Program with Janelia Research Campus. Advisors: Eva Pastalkova (2012–16), Albert Lee & Sandro Romani (2016–18); Chicago advisor Nicholas Hatsopoulos.
2007–2009
BA, Neuroscience, Vanderbilt University. Research with Ford Ebner.

Publications

See Research for plain-English summaries and links.

  1. Agarwal G, Akera S, Lustig B, Pastalkova E, Lee AK, Sommer FT (2026). Deciphering hippocampal place codes in weak theta rhythms. Nature Communications 17:2735.
  2. Lustig B, Wang Y, Romani S, Pastalkova E, Lee AK (2025). Signatures of remote planning in hippocampal replay. bioRxiv.
  3. Lai C, Kim D, Lustig B, Tanaka S, Barbarits B, Narayan L, Colonell J, et al., Harris TD (2023). Low-latency extracellular spike assignment for high-density electrodes at single-neuron resolution. bioRxiv.
  4. Lustig BR (2018). Context dependent activity in rat hippocampus during performance of a three arm delayed sequence task. PhD thesis, University of Chicago.
  5. Lustig B, Wang Y, Pastalkova E (2016). Oscillatory patterns in hippocampus under light and deep isoflurane anesthesia closely mirror prominent brain states in awake animals. Hippocampus 26:102–109.
  6. Wang Y, Romani S, Lustig B, Leonardo A, Pastalkova E (2015). Theta sequences are essential for internally generated hippocampal firing fields. Nature Neuroscience 18:282–288.
  7. Ghoshal A, Lustig B, Popescu M, Ebner F, Pouget P (2014). Unilateral whisker trimming in newborn rats alters neuronal coincident discharge among mature barrel cortex neurons. J Neurophysiol 112:1925–1935.
  8. Ruiz O, Lustig BR, Nassi JJ, Cetin A, Reynolds JH, Albright TD, Callaway EM, Stoner GR, Roe AW (2013). Optogenetics through windows on the brain in the nonhuman primate. J Neurophysiol 110:1455–1467.
  9. Lustig BR, Friedman RM, Winberry JE, Ebner FF, Roe AW (2013). Voltage-sensitive dye imaging reveals shifting spatiotemporal spread of whisker-induced activity in rat barrel cortex. J Neurophysiol 109:2382–2392.

Talks, meetings & organizing

2019
Selected speaker, Janelia Research Campus Annual Symposium
2012
Co-organizer (with members of Krishna Shenoy's lab), SfN nanosymposium on optogenetics in non-human primates, New Orleans
2012
Cosyne Workshop, Sensorimotor processes reflected in spatiotemporal patterns of neuronal activity, Snowbird, UT
2011
Stanford Bio-X optogenetics course (Karl Deisseroth, Krishna Shenoy)
2007
AAAI Fall Symposium on AI and Consciousness, Arlington, VA
2009–2022
Nine Society for Neuroscience posters (five first-author)

Teaching & outreach

2019
Course leader & volunteer, RESET STEM Day, Janelia
2013
Teaching assistant, Undergraduate Systems Neuroscience, University of Chicago
2012
Teaching assistant, Survey of Systems Neuroscience (graduate), University of Chicago
2010
Volunteer, Brain Blast, Adventure Science Museum, Nashville
2007–2008
Volunteer, Vanderbilt Students Volunteer for Science

Skills

Experimental
Acute and chronic silicon-probe electrophysiology in freely moving rats; custom multi-drive, multi-probe implants; optogenetics with custom laser-diode and fiber coupling; voltage-sensitive dye and intrinsic-signal optical imaging in rodents and primates; artificial-dura windows; surgery and anesthesia across species.
Computational
MATLAB (expert), Python (NumPy, PyTorch), C, JavaScript; Bayesian population decoding; replay detection; shuffle-based statistics; machine learning (masked autoencoders, deep RL); reproducible figure pipelines.
Hardware & systems
PCB design, Arduino, LabVIEW; Amplipex, SpikeGLX, Open Ephys, Plexon; RedShirt and Optical Imaging Ltd. imaging systems.

Memberships

Society for Neuroscience, 2009–present. References available on request.