Bourns College of Engineering

A211 Bourns Hall  Riverside, CA 92521
Phone: 951-827-TBD
Fax: 951-827-6416

B. Hyle Park

Degrees

Ph.D. Physics 2005

University of California, Irvine

M.S. Physics 2001

University of California, Irvine

B.S. Physics 1996

California Institute of Technology

Awards

• 2007 NIH Pathway to Independence (PI) Award

Research Area

Development and application of optical imaging techniques to neuroscience

Publications

For additional information, please see Professor Park's faculty webpage.

Biography

A great wealth of knowledge has been accumulated regarding how individual neurons and associated cells work, and technologies such as MRI provide access to how large numbers of cells work collectively.  The area in between these regimes has proven to be more difficult to investigate, and is an exciting and rapidly growing field of research.  Current technology largely limits the analysis of neuronal processing to single or small clusters of neurons using a variety of electrodes or the introduction of exogenous chemical agents.  My research goal is to apply minimally-invasive non-contact optical techniques to answer questions involving the structure, viability, and activity in nerves and neural networks with the twin goals of complementing current methodologies and knowledge in neuroscience and finding ways to apply these discoveries clinically.  Two current projects are: 1) application of polarization-sensitive optical coherence tomography for non-destructive quantitative assessment of nerve myelination, and 2) detection of slight transient structural changes associated with action potential propagation as a means to optically record nerve activity in a non-contact manner.