George Dragoi, MD, PhD

Dr. George Dragoi is Associate Professor of Psychiatry and of Neuroscience in the Department of Psychiatry at Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, CT. He holds M.D. degree from the Gr. T. Popa University of Medicine and Pharmacy of Iasi, Romania and Ph.D. degree in Behavioral and Neural Science from Rutgers University where he worked in the laboratory of Dr. Gyorgy Buzsaki. He completed his postdoctoral studies at the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the laboratory of Dr. Susumu Tonegawa. Dr. Dragoi studies the neurophysiological basis of the organization of hippocampal neurons into cellular assemblies and their dynamic grouping during novel spatial exploration and in response to long-term synaptic plasticity. Recently, he revealed the existence of preconfigured cellular assemblies that pre-play in time the spatial sequences occurring during a future novel spatial experience in naive animals. Dr. Dragoi’ current research focuses on the role of neuronal activity and prior experience in cellular assembly organization and animal learning with implications for our better understanding of neuropsychiatric diseases.