Manuel Díaz-Ríos, PhD

Manuel Diaz-Rios, PhD obtained his bachelor's degree in biology from the University of Puerto Rico-Río Piedras Campus. He then obtained his PhD in anatomy and neurobiology from the University of Puerto Rico School of Medicine where he studied the neural circuits that control feeding behavior in the marine mollusk Aplysia Californica using electrophysiology and immunohistochemistry. Díaz-Ríos then did postdoctoral work as an APA fellow at Cornell University in the department of neurobiology and behavior working on the spinal circuits that control walking in mice using electrophysiology and two-photon calcium imaging. He was then a professor of anatomy, embryology, and neuroscience at the University of Puerto Rico School of Medicine for 14 years and is currently a professor of neuroscience and biology at Bowdoin College, where he works with mammalian spinal circuits with a focus on the effects that environmental stressors and degenerative diseases have on the nervous system. He has been awarded grants from all major research funding agencies including NIH, NSF, and DoD as well as private foundations such as the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation and the Grass Foundation.