Welcome to my website!

My name is Zhilei Zhao. I'm currently a postdoctoral researcher in the Goldberg Lab at Cornell University, with the support of Klarman Fellowship.

I am passionate about animal behaviors and the underlying neural mechanisms. I conduct research in neuroethology, a highly interdisciplinary field combining ethology, neurobiology, and evolutionary biology.

To survive and thrive, many animal species have evolved unique and specialized behaviors. Some of these behaviors make us laugh, e.g. parrots imitating our speech; while some make us suffer, e.g. mosquitoes tracking and biting humans.

Because these specialized behaviors are under strong selection pressure, the brains must have evolved clever and efficient neural algorithms and implementations. I believe that by carefully choosing the animal species and studying what they can naturally do best, we will not only reveal novel and surprising neural mechanisms for these unique behaviors, but also gain broader insights about how complexity in neuronal circuits emerges during evolution. This research strategy complements the mainstream approach that focuses on a few model organisms.

I have studied two such systems so far. During my PhD research, I asked why mosquitoes are so good at finding humans and revealed surprising mechanisms in their olfactory circuits. For my postdoc research, I switched to a more complex brain and asked why parrots possess the unique ability of imitating human speech. More details in the corresponding tabs!