Background
Gazzaley was born in Brooklyn, New York, and graduated from the Bronx High School of Science in 1986.
Gazzaley was born in Brooklyn, New York, and graduated from the Bronx High School of Science in 1986.
He received a Bachelor of Science degree in biochemistry from Binghamton University in 1990, followed by Doctor of Medicine He completed an internship in internal medicine (1998-1999) and residency in neurology (1999-2002) at the University of Pennsylvania Health System.
He is the founding director of the Neuroscience Imaging Center and Professor of Neurology, Physiology, and Psychiatry at University of California, San Francisco (University of California, San Francisco). He has authored over 100 scientific articles And Doctor of Philosophy degreed in Neuroscience through the National Institutes of Health-sponsored Medical Scientist Training Program at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New New York
His doctoral research on plasticity of glutamate receptors in the hippocampus and implications for cognitive changes in normal aging earned him the 1997 Krieg Cortical Scholar Award.
Following residency in 2002, Gazzaley had a research fellowship at the University of California, Berkeley, and simultaneously worked as Attending Neurologist at the Northern California Virginia Medical Center, University of California, San Francisco Medical Center and completed a clinical fellowship in cognitive neurology at the University of California, San Francisco Memory and Aging Center. becoming board-certified in neurology. Gazzaley founded Wanderings in 2000, a fine art photography site featuring his nature photography.
Gazzaley founded Gazzaley Laboratory at University of California, San Francisco in 2006 and the University of California, San Francisco Neuroscience Imaging Center in 2007. His research approach uses a combination of human neurophysiological tools, including functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), electroencephalography (Electroencephalogram) and transcranial stimulation (TES).
He used this approach to show that older adults exhibit neural deficits in suppressing distractions and also while multitasking.
Several of Gazzaley"s studies explore how cognitive abilities may be enhanced via engagement with custom designed video games, neurofeedback and TES. In 2009 he designed a video game, NeuroRacer, to enhance cognitive abilities of older adults. In a study published in 2013 as the cover story of Nature he showed that the multitasking nature of the game caused improvements in tasks outside of the game involving working memory and sustained attention. He created the Neuroscape Laboratory at University of California, San Francisco, an environment designed to create and validate neurodiagnostics and neurotherapeutics using newly emerging technology.
He developed the GlassBrain, a 3D Medical Research Institute brain visualization that displays overlaid rhythmic brain activity in real-time using Electroencephalogram recordings in collaboration with scientists at University of California, San Diego. In 2011, Gazzaley co-founded Akili Interactive Labs, a company hoping to create the first Food and Drug Administration approved video game, and acts as its Chief Science Advisor.
His research has been profiled in The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Wall Street Journal, TIME, Discover, Wired, Public Broadcasting Service, National Public Radio, Cable News Network, and National Broadcasting Company Nightly News. In 2013, he wrote and hosted the nationally televised, Public Broadcasting Service-sponsored special, “The Distracted Mind with Doctor Adam Gazzaley” In 2014, he co-hosted TEDMED 2014.
