Dr. Jonathan Demb

Biography

Jonathan Demb is a Professor in the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Science at Yale University. He completed his PhD at Stanford University in 1997 and underwent postdoctoral training at the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to joining Yale in 2011, he was a faculty member at the University of Michigan. Demb’s research focuses on the cellular and synaptic mechanisms that enable visual processing in the mammalian retina. His significant contributions to the field include identifying nonlinearities in retinal synapses, elucidating the role of disinhibition in visual contrast processing, and characterizing the asymmetries of the retina's pathways. He has developed techniques such as the glutamate sensor (iGluSnFR) to study retinal circuitry and has identified novel amacrine cell circuits using optogenetic technology. Demb serves as a Reviewing Editor for the Journal of Neuroscience and is on the Editorial Board of PLoS Biology. He received the Cogan Award from the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO) in 2013 for his contributions to retinal neuroscience.

Research Interests