JOE Z. TSIEN has been an assistant professor in the department of molecular biology at Princeton University since 1997. He came to the U.S. in 1986 after graduating from East China Normal University in Shanghai and working for two years as an instructor at East China University of Science and Technology in Shanghai. He received his Ph.D. in biochemistry and molecular biology in 1990 from the University of Minnesota. He has consulted for several biotechnology companies seeking to develop therapies for age-related memory disorders. The Doogie mouse was a hit in his seven-year-old son's class during show-and-tell.
The Memory Code
Researchers are closing in on the rules that the brain uses to lay down memories. Discovery of this memory code could lead to the design of smarter computers and robots and even to new ways to peer into the human mind
Building a Brainier Mouse
By genetically engineering a smarter than average mouse, scientists have assembled some of the central molecular components of learning and memory