Entry Date:
January 26, 2016

Investigating Neural Signals Underlying Language Processing in the Human Brain

Principal Investigator Boris Katz

Co-investigator Gabriel Kreiman


We take advantage of a rare opportunity to interrogate the neural signals underlying language processing in the human brain by invasively recording field potentials from the human cortex in epileptic patients. These signals provide high spatial and temporal resolution and therefore are ideally suited to investigate language processing, a question that is difficult to study in animal models.

We take advantage of a rare opportunity to interrogate the neural signals underlying language processing in the human brain by invasively recording field potentials from the human cortex in epileptic patients. These signals provide high spatial and temporal resolution and therefore are ideally suited to investigate language processing, a question that is difficult to study in animal models. This project examines how cortical signals represent different aspects of language processing including basic word properties (length, type, semantics), grammatical structures and extraction of meaning.