Neuroscience is one of the most exciting and rapidly developing areas of science right now. While many different scientific disciplines study the nervous system (biology, chemistry, physics, computer science, etc.), this course is an introduction to the biology of the nervous system. Specifically, we will take a systems neuroscience approach. While Neuroscience 1 focuses on neurons, molecules, and synapses, in Neuroscience 2, we will learn how these elements work together to give rise to complex functions like sensation, perception, and movement.

This course examines hormonal processes and the neuroendocrine systems that regulate behavior in human and non-human animals. We will integrate multiple levels of biological organization, from molecules to organisms, to understand interactions among hormones, the nervous system, behavior, and the environment. Hormones are a critically important mechanism for integrating internal physiological state with the environment to generate behavior across diverse species. Understanding these hormonal mechanisms, and the behaviors they regulate, has broad consequences for individuals, health and medicine, society, and evolution. For example, foundational knowledge of behavioral neuroendocrinology is directly relevant to understanding hormone-sensitive cancers and their treatments, the long-term impacts of early-life stress/trauma, reproductive health, gender and sex, endocrine disruptors, as well as our own behavior.