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Eviatar Isac Yemini PhD

TitleAssistant Professor
InstitutionUMass Chan Medical School
DepartmentNeurobiology
AddressUMass Chan Medical School
366 Plantation Street, NERB
Worcester MA 01605
Phone508-856-4117
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    Other Positions
    InstitutionT.H. Chan School of Medicine
    DepartmentNeurobiology

    InstitutionT.H. Chan School of Medicine
    DepartmentNeuroNexus Institute

    InstitutionMorningside Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences
    DepartmentBiophysical Chemical and Computational Biology

    InstitutionMorningside Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences
    DepartmentInterdisciplinary Graduate Program

    InstitutionMorningside Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences
    DepartmentNeuroscience


    Collapse Biography 
    Collapse education and training
    Columbia University, New York, NY, United StatesBA
    University of California, San Diego, San Diego, CA, United StatesMSComputational Neurobiology
    University of Cambridge, Cambridge, , United KingdomPHDNeurobiology
    Collapse awards and honors
    2007 - 2011Gates Cambridge Scholar, University of Cambridge
    2022 - 2025Klingenstein-Simons Fellowship Award in Neurosciences, Klingenstein Philanthropies & Simons Foundation

    Collapse Overview 
    Collapse Summary
    The Yemini Lab investigates how nervous systems change during development and evolution to generate new behaviors. We use cutting-edge tools and a multiscale systems-biology approach to study the genes, circuitry, and neural activity driving behavioral changes. Our findings provide a foundation to understand normal brain development and brain disorders (e.g., autism and intellectual disabilities).
    Collapse overview

    The goal of the Yemini Lab is to understand how a nervous system grows to meet the behavioral needs of specific stages of life. Tools we pioneered for the worm C. elegans enable us to connect behavioral changes during development to causative changes at the genetic, molecular, cellular, and neural communication levels, illuminating precisely how a nervous system grows and changes.

    With these tools we are developing a systems-biology model of a whole nervous system, at single-cell resolution, establishing the logic and mechanisms of how this network is reconfigured during development. Additionally, we are expanding our “NeuroPAL” method (color barcodes for in vivo cell type identification) to other model organisms.


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    Collapse Bibliographic 
    Collapse selected publications
    Publications listed below are automatically derived from MEDLINE/PubMed and other sources, which might result in incorrect or missing publications. Faculty can login to make corrections and additions.
    Newest   |   Oldest   |   Most Cited   |   Most Discussed   |   Timeline   |   Field Summary   |   Plain Text
    PMC Citations indicate the number of times the publication was cited by articles in PubMed Central, and the Altmetric score represents citations in news articles and social media. (Note that publications are often cited in additional ways that are not shown here.) Fields are based on how the National Library of Medicine (NLM) classifies the publication's journal and might not represent the specific topic of the publication. Translation tags are based on the publication type and the MeSH terms NLM assigns to the publication. Some publications (especially newer ones and publications not in PubMed) might not yet be assigned Field or Translation tags.) Click a Field or Translation tag to filter the publications.
    1. Sprague DY, Rusch K, Dunn RL, Borchardt JM, Ban S, Bubnis G, Chiu GC, Wen C, Suzuki R, Chaudhary S, Lee HJ, Yu Z, Dichter B, Ly R, Onami S, Lu H, Kimura KD, Yemini E, Kato S. Unifying community whole-brain imaging datasets enables robust neuron identification and reveals determinants of neuron position in C.?elegans. Cell Rep Methods. 2025 Jan 27; 5(1):100964. PMID: 39826553.
      Citations:    
    2. Guo M, Wu Y, Hobson CM, Su Y, Qian S, Krueger E, Christensen R, Kroeschell G, Bui J, Chaw M, Zhang L, Liu J, Hou X, Han X, Lu Z, Ma X, Zhovmer A, Combs C, Moyle M, Yemini E, Liu H, Liu Z, Benedetto A, La Riviere P, Col?n-Ramos D, Shroff H. Deep learning-based aberration compensation improves contrast and resolution in fluorescence microscopy. Nat Commun. 2025 Jan 02; 16(1):313. PMID: 39747824.
      Citations:    
    3. Guo M, Wu Y, Hobson CM, Su Y, Qian S, Krueger E, Christensen R, Kroeschell G, Bui J, Chaw M, Zhang L, Liu J, Hou X, Han X, Lu Z, Ma X, Zhovmer A, Combs C, Moyle M, Yemini E, Liu H, Liu Z, Benedetto A, La Riviere P, Col?n-Ramos D, Shroff H. Deep learning-based aberration compensation improves contrast and resolution in fluorescence microscopy. bioRxiv. 2024 Jul 15. PMID: 37986950.
      Citations:    
    4. Sprague DY, Rusch K, Dunn RL, Borchardt JM, Ban S, Bubnis G, Chiu GC, Wen C, Suzuki R, Chaudhary S, Lee HJ, Yu Z, Dichter B, Ly R, Onami S, Lu H, Kimura KD, Yemini E, Kato S. Unifying community-wide whole-brain imaging datasets enables robust automated neuron identification and reveals determinants of neuron positioning in C. elegans. bioRxiv. 2024 Jun 29. PMID: 38746302.
      Citations:    
    5. Dyballa L, Lang S, Haslund-Gourley A, Yemini E, Zucker SW. Learning dynamic representations of the functional connectome in neurobiological networks. ArXiv. 2024 Feb 27. PMID: 38463505.
      Citations:    
    6. Yemini E. Systems neuroscience: Foraging through serotonin's tangled web. Curr Biol. 2023 07 24; 33(14):R767-R770. PMID: 37490863.
      Citations:    Fields:    Translation:Animals
    7. Nejatbakhsh A, Dey N, Venkatachalam V, Yemini E, Paninski L, Varol E. Learning Probabilistic Piecewise Rigid Atlases of Model Organisms via Generative Deep Networks. Inf Process Med Imaging. 2023 Jun; 13939:332-343. PMID: 37476079.
      Citations:    Fields:    
    8. Masoudi N, Schnabel R, Yemini E, Leyva-D?az E, Hobert O. Cell-specific effects of the sole C. elegans Daughterless/E protein homolog, HLH-2, on nervous system development. Development. 2023 01 01; 150(1). PMID: 36595352.
      Citations:    Fields:    Translation:Animals
    9. Gadenne MJ, Hardege I, Yemini E, Suleski D, Jaggers P, Beets I, Schafer WR, Chew YL. Neuropeptide signalling shapes feeding and reproductive behaviours in male Caenorhabditis elegans. Life Sci Alliance. 2022 10; 5(10). PMID: 35738805.
      Citations: 2     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    10. Skuhersky M, Wu T, Yemini E, Nejatbakhsh A, Boyden E, Tegmark M. Toward a more accurate 3D atlas of C. elegans neurons. BMC Bioinformatics. 2022 May 28; 23(1):195. PMID: 35643434.
      Citations: 1     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    11. Tekieli T, Yemini E, Nejatbakhsh A, Wang C, Varol E, Fernandez RW, Masoudi N, Paninski L, Hobert O. Visualizing the organization and differentiation of the male-specific nervous system of C. elegans. Development. 2021 09 15; 148(18). PMID: 34415309.
      Citations: 6     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    12. Emmons SW, Yemini E, Zimmer M. Methods for analyzing neuronal structure and activity in Caenorhabditis elegans. Genetics. 2021 08 09; 218(4). PMID: 34151952.
      Citations: 3     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    13. Taylor SR, Santpere G, Weinreb A, Barrett A, Reilly MB, Xu C, Varol E, Oikonomou P, Glenwinkel L, McWhirter R, Poff A, Basavaraju M, Rafi I, Yemini E, Cook SJ, Abrams A, Vidal B, Cros C, Tavazoie S, Sestan N, Hammarlund M, Hobert O, Miller DM. Molecular topography of an entire nervous system. Cell. 2021 08 05; 184(16):4329-4347.e23. PMID: 34237253.
      Citations: 157     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    14. Glenwinkel L, Taylor SR, Langebeck-Jensen K, Pereira L, Reilly MB, Basavaraju M, Rafi I, Yemini E, Pocock R, Sestan N, Hammarlund M, Miller DM, Hobert O. In silico analysis of the transcriptional regulatory logic of neuronal identity specification throughout the C. elegans nervous system. Elife. 2021 06 24; 10. PMID: 34165430.
      Citations: 7     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    15. Masoudi N, Yemini E, Schnabel R, Hobert O. Piecemeal regulation of convergent neuronal lineages by bHLH transcription factors in Caenorhabditis elegans. Development. 2021 06 01; 148(11). PMID: 34100067.
      Citations: 8     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    16. Yemini E, Lin A, Nejatbakhsh A, Varol E, Sun R, Mena GE, Samuel ADT, Paninski L, Venkatachalam V, Hobert O. NeuroPAL: A Multicolor Atlas for Whole-Brain Neuronal Identification in C.?elegans. Cell. 2021 01 07; 184(1):272-288.e11. PMID: 33378642.
      Citations: 72     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    17. Reilly MB, Cros C, Varol E, Yemini E, Hobert O. Unique homeobox codes delineate all the neuron classes of C.?elegans. Nature. 2020 08; 584(7822):595-601. PMID: 32814896.
      Citations: 48     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    18. Cook SJ, Crouse CM, Yemini E, Hall DH, Emmons SW, Hobert O. The connectome of the Caenorhabditis elegans pharynx. J Comp Neurol. 2020 11 01; 528(16):2767-2784. PMID: 32352566.
      Citations: 13     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    19. Javer A, Currie M, Lee CW, Hokanson J, Li K, Martineau CN, Yemini E, Grundy LJ, Li C, Ch'ng Q, Schafer WR, Nollen EAA, Kerr R, Brown AEX. An open-source platform for analyzing and sharing worm-behavior data. Nat Methods. 2018 09; 15(9):645-646. PMID: 30171234.
      Citations: 43     Fields:    Translation:Animals
    20. Bentley B, Branicky R, Barnes CL, Chew YL, Yemini E, Bullmore ET, V?rtes PE, Schafer WR. The Multilayer Connectome of Caenorhabditis elegans. PLoS Comput Biol. 2016 12; 12(12):e1005283. PMID: 27984591.
      Citations: 60     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    21. Kato S, Kaplan HS, Schr?del T, Skora S, Lindsay TH, Yemini E, Lockery S, Zimmer M. Global brain dynamics embed the motor command sequence of Caenorhabditis elegans. Cell. 2015 Oct 22; 163(3):656-69. PMID: 26478179.
      Citations: 190     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    22. Butler VJ, Branicky R, Yemini E, Liewald JF, Gottschalk A, Kerr RA, Chklovskii DB, Schafer WR. A consistent muscle activation strategy underlies crawling and swimming in Caenorhabditis elegans. J R Soc Interface. 2015 Jan 06; 12(102):20140963. PMID: 25551155.
      Citations: 21     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    23. Yemini EI, Brown AE. Tracking Single C. elegans Using a USB Microscope on a Motorized Stage. Methods Mol Biol. 2015; 1327:181-97. PMID: 26423975.
      Citations:    Fields:    Translation:Animals
    24. Yemini E, Jucikas T, Grundy LJ, Brown AE, Schafer WR. A database of Caenorhabditis elegans behavioral phenotypes. Nat Methods. 2013 Sep; 10(9):877-9. PMID: 23852451.
      Citations: 147     Fields:    Translation:Animals
    25. Brown AE, Yemini EI, Grundy LJ, Jucikas T, Schafer WR. A dictionary of behavioral motifs reveals clusters of genes affecting Caenorhabditis elegans locomotion. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2013 Jan 08; 110(2):791-6. PMID: 23267063.
      Citations: 95     Fields:    Translation:Animals
    26. Cohen E, Yemini E, Schafer W, Feitelson DG, Treinin M. Locomotion analysis identifies roles of mechanosensory neurons in governing locomotion dynamics of C. elegans. J Exp Biol. 2012 Oct 15; 215(Pt 20):3639-48. PMID: 22811252.
      Citations: 14     Fields:    Translation:AnimalsCells
    27. Yemini E, Kerr RA, Schafer WR. Preparation of samples for single-worm tracking. Cold Spring Harb Protoc. 2011 Dec 01; 2011(12):1475-9. PMID: 22135667.
      Citations: 8     Fields:    Translation:Animals
    28. Yemini E, Kerr RA, Schafer WR. Illumination for worm tracking and behavioral imaging. Cold Spring Harb Protoc. 2011 Dec 01; 2011(12):1480-2. PMID: 22135668.
      Citations: 5     Fields:    Translation:Animals
    29. Yemini E, Kerr RA, Schafer WR. Tracking movement behavior of multiple worms on food. Cold Spring Harb Protoc. 2011 Dec 01; 2011(12):1483-7. PMID: 22135669.
      Citations: 7     Fields:    Translation:Animals
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