Michael Jacob Kahana, Ph.D., is the Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Term Professor of Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. Kahana’s work combines behavioral, neural, and computational approaches to the study of human memory. Kahana obtained his doctoral training at the University of Toronto (1990-1993), where he studied under the mentorship of Bennet B. Murdock and Endel Tulving. Kahana then obtained postdoctoral training at Harvard University (1993-1994) under the mentorship of William K. Estes. He then became an assistant professor at Brandeis University in 1994, and an associate professor in 2000. He joined the University of Pennsylvania as Professor in 2004. Dr. Kahana’s research career has been focused on advancing our understanding of human memory using a combination of behavioral, neural, and computational approaches. His work has looked into memory in young adults, older adults and patients with neurological disorders, such as epilepsy and Parkinson’s disease. Over the years his lab has identified specific univariate neural correlates of memory and cognition (theta and gamma activity; place cells and grid cells). More recent work has moved to using multivariate methods to decode latent variables associated with memory encoding and retrieval, as well as using brain stimulation to modulate memory and its neural biomarkers.
