Tomomi Karigo

Tomomi discovered two different forms of male mounting behavior in mice, a male-directed form used to establish social dominance, and a female-directed form used for reproduction.  She found that these two forms are controlled by distinct regions and cell types in the hypothalamus. This work uncovered a subset of "make love, not war" neurons in the medial preoptic area whose activation in males can interrupt ongoing attack and convert it to reproductive mounting behavior. Her work was published in Nature. Tomomi is an assistant professor in the department of Neuroscience at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Kennedy Krieger Institute. Learn more about her lab here.